Chapter 37 - A Gamble for Survival (Patreon)

“Put them down right there,” Lex urged.

We’d run away for many minutes and were near the point of exhaustion. Four of us were carrying a person on our backs. 

We’d found ourselves in a mangrove of trees that had arched and knitted together in some sort of half above-ground cave. It was dark, and the miasma wasn’t as thick. We’d clearly moved somewhere far from the center of the forest, but we were still lost. None of us thought about heading home with Faragore on our tail. All we wanted to do was escape. 

“Check for breathing,” ordered Christopher.

We each had our respective person on the ground, as safe as possible, nestled between branches and moss. I had Bydon under my control, as he was the largest and I was the second strongest of the group. Cuts rained over his body. They were closing now that his mana was back and he wasn’t fighting, but the damage was done. He’d lost a ton of blood, gone anemic, and passed out. But he’d recover with rest. The only problem was, we were stuck deep in the Forest of Beginners with Faragore on our trail. None of us had the time to rest.

“I can feel its miasma getting closer,” I said. My neck was craned back in the direction from which we came. “It’s following us.”

“No surprise there,” said Lex as she tended to Tart’s arm, fixing the quick cauterization while the forest devil was unconscious. She cleaned up some of the flayed flesh and burnt points with her dagger and smoothed other sections with her fingertip, set ablaze like a surgical instrument. “We’ve pissed it off. It’s probably honed in on us. It won’t leave us alone unless we do something.”

“What could we possibly do?” asked Christopher. He was tense and brimming with sweat. He had a few nicks and cuts on him, but his mana was already healing him, too. Out of all of us, he was the best in shape. While speaking, he was checking on Barcus, who was doing as well as Bydon was.

“We’ll need to mix in my mana removal at random intervals to confuse it,” said Gai. He was looking over Nigel. “Nigel’s stable, Yen. Limb is reattached, and his breathing’s steady, but he’s out cold.”

“They all are,” muttered Lex. “Four unconscious burdens.”

“Let me guess? We should leave them and try to make a break for ourselves?” I asked her, my voice venomous with warning.

“I wouldn’t have bothered carrying anyone if I believed that.” Lex slumped to the ground. She was exhausted. “We have to do something about that thing. At least we have even more options now.” She pointed at my pinkie fingers. “Congrats, by the way. Fire’s the hardest to get a second band for, but you’ll figure it out now that you’ve got a feel.” She wiped her hair back so it was out of her eyes. “But honestly, we do only have like three options.”

“Leave them, try hiding, or fight,” concluded Gai for Lex.

“Option One is a guaranteed survival tactic,” muttered Lex.

“Which we will not consider,” said Christopher.

“Not doing it,” I added at the same time.

“So not an option,” said Lex. “Option Two really isn’t an option either. We’d have to keep attacking, running, hiding, and repeating. It would only work if none of us got injured, we kept getting away successfully, and it eventually gave up. That’s assuming we can find our way back under such pressure and not lead it back to Sandy Branch either.”

“Then we fight,” I grunted. “Simple.”

“Not simple. It was kicking the crap out of us,” said Gai. “And it was intelligent. It targeted me specifically because it could sense I was the cause of the mana removal. Then it used that as a tactic to attack the others and sow chaos. It used strategy.”

I looked between him and Lex. “I take it neither of you has dealt with one of these things before?”

They shook their heads.

“There are maybe a few thousand people in the world who could kill that thing while working in a group,” acknowledged Lex. She was checking her arms and legs for injuries. “Even fewer could do it solo. Maybe less than a hundred. I don’t know. Just guessing.” She pointed at me, smiling wryly. “You’d basically have to take that thing solo, with some very minor backup.”

“Gai’s not minor backup,” I said.

“I barely did anything,” uttered Gai. He was trying to smile, but his voice sounded defeated. Dirt and blood caked his body, but none of it was his. They were the aftermath of those who defended him with their lives. 

“What do you normally use your fifth band for?” I asked. “What’s the general scenario? Have you tried using it in strange ways? Playing with it?”

“Why? Got an idea?”

“Maybe. Humor me.”

“You’ve seen what I do.” Gai waved his hand in front of his face like he was wiping condensation from a window. “I make all mana go away in a set radius, and it stops for everyone, including me, since my mana is only being prioritized for the suppression of others.”

“Yet you’ve played with the radius.”

“Of course.” Gai made a circular motion around his head. “Smallest I can make it is a foot’s distance around my body. Any spells that hit me immediately fizzle out.”

“Even rocks or ones that come connected from the environment? Like, if I used my mana to move a boulder off a cliff and it fell on you, would your mana still cancel it out?”

“In that instance, no, it wouldn’t work.”

“Great! So there are loopholes.” I clapped my hands together. “What about an arrow or weapon infused with mana from the Heavenly style?”

“As soon as the mana passed me, the spell or power within would go away.”

“So any power in it would disappear, but the forces acting upon it would not, yes?”

“...you’re right, I think.”

I smiled. “Then I believe I have a plan.”

•••

Faragore had lived in the Forest of Beginners since long before the trees covered the skies in the deepest parts of the forest. The people it first ate did not have sophisticated weapons made of steel, but of iron. It had seen the passing of cultures, the deaths of armies, the extinction of animals, and the loss of stars in the sky.

It comprehended these things, to a certain degree, but not in the way a human would. It recognized the world around it and was curious, but these thoughts were often burdened with animalistic tendencies. 

Faragore had its territory. It liked its territory. When it wanted to hunt, the game was large enough to sustain its miasma, but not so large that it was ever threatened. The only competition it had was from the other three that grew up with him around the Forest Spirit. But they all kept to their own territories, never bothering each other, and with no intention to ever do so.

Throughout the centuries, the forest had experienced changes. Yet Faragore could only remember very few prompting it to leave its territory.

Before Zalevet was called Zalevet, small settlers reigned freely across the continent with no higher government or authority controlling them. The settlers expected to find abundant resources, plentiful food, and timber to cut at their leisure. Faragore, nameless at the time yet still sentient to a degree, altered those expectations from hopes to horrors.

As soon as the groups came in to harvest wood and hunt, Faragore struck from the shadows. They’d entered his territory, so it was only fair in its eyes. And it’s not like it ate all of them. Faragore let a few of them go. It’d give it peace for a while, as past experience told it that killing every human led to more humans coming to look for those who were lost.

If things went too far, then humans armed with weapons in spells would destroy the forest. They never frightened Faragore, but they certainly annoyed it. Lost trees and killed monsters meant what Faragore possessed—its territory and prey—were taken. And that always angered it. It’d kill the humans that invaded, then follow them back to their source, massacre them, and quietly return to its home in peace. At least for a few decades.

Faragore noticed this happened in patterns. Peace, humans, destruction, rampage, then peace again. Over and over and over again, it’s entire known existence.

Now was a time for rampage. Too many humans had invaded its lands. Faragore had to seek and kill all he could find until they stopped coming again.

Only this time, its prey was rather troublesome.

Usually, they fired pointless spells at him, shot him with arrows, and jabbed him with weak weapons. They bounced off meanlessly, and he’d crush and eat them.

The humans, this time, were agile. Their attacks were precise, and the spells were more powerful. Worse, one of them could cut off Faragore’s connection to the miasma. It gave him life and power. Cutting it off from it made it feel cold, weak, and scared. And Faragore didn’t like that. 

But no matter how hard he tried to kill that human, the others it brought kept getting Faragore’s way. Even worse, one caused it…pain? It had been many, many years since it last felt any.

When Faragore had the chance, it wounded the one that hurt it. Its arm was tough and meaty, but it filled its belly and satisfied its rage.

The rest began to fall, easily, one after the other. None stood out to Faragore besides the miasma stealing one. Not until the flying one came and threw all Faragore’s miasma back in its face. That human, with horns sticking out of its head, gave it the strongest attack Faragore had ever felt, and it angered it to its core. Then and there, it decided to eat that one first, then the mana-stealing one, then the others afterward. Only once Faragore found the nearest settlement and destroyed it would it finally be satiated.

Faragore followed the humans’ trail. They’d fled during the last attack, but it mattered little. Faragore had their scent and could sense their mana. They’d need to flee multiple hours away from it for Faragore not to detect them. They neither had the time nor the ability. Not with the creature so intent on killing them.

So it followed, trudging through the forest slowly, deliberately, and angrily. The miasma that had once infested it as a deer now bent to its will, killing trees, flowers, and animals that dared get in its way. Other monster kept their distance, though they watched Faragore. With a flicker of its glance in their direction, they’d run. Even monsters only a Tier below it cowered in its wake.

Faragore couldn’t remember the last time it’d been challenged for dominance. This battle with the humans was probably the closest.

Faragore felt the scent and mana of those humans grow stronger. It pushed aside dense trees to make a path before finding itself in a clearing. Trees created an artificial cave-like structure. Faragore found it to be cozy. Once it had completed its self-appointed tasks, it would rest there.

But already, there were invaders to its humble abode. Four of the humans it was chasing lay unconscious in the little cave. Faragore didn’t mind. He’d leech their life with miasma, then crush their bones, although he was disappointed it didn’t get to fight for food. That always made it taste better.

Miasma swelled in Faragore’s body. It sucked it in from the environment, curling and twirling in its core until it was leaking black, gray, and silver smoke out of every opening. Faragore allowed the majority of it to concentrate in its mouth. The miasma would blow out, sap the humans’ life from them, cut them up into nice, bite-sized pieces, and grant it a tasty meal.

In fact, Faragore saw the one that hurt it sitting amongst the unconscious bodies. It recognized its missing arm. Gleefully, the miasma lapped around its mouth, ready to kill.

Miasma began to leek between its bony teeth.

Suddenly, its connection to the forest, to its power, went away.

“Hello there,” chimed a voice.

Faragore looked left. The human who could stop its miasma was right there, waving, its mouth stretched upward, bearing its teeth.

It would kill the human if it were the last thing it did.

“Please work,” the man said, not moving, as Faragore lifted its arm to gouge him.

THUNK!

An arrow pierced through the top of Faragore’s mouth. It pinned the creature’s top jaw to its lower, clamping them shut.

Pain shot through Faragore’s head. Its hand reached up to claw the arrow as it stumbled backward.

“It wooooorks!” A feminine, sing-songy voice echoed in the trees.

“Wonder if I would have thought of this if I could use the Warring style?” wondered another voice, feminine as well, though much lower and a little colder. “Probably. I’m smart.”

THUNK! THUNK! THUNK! THUNK!

An arrow hit each joint in Faragore’s arms and legs, sending it spiraling. It screamed, snapped its jaw open, and broke the arrow that had pinned it shut. The wound left a hole in the top and bottom of its jaw, piercing its tongue and sending blood and air through both ends.

For the first time it could remember, Faragore felt something it hadn’t felt before.

Fear.

*•*•*

Gai bolted into the trees as the Faragore slapped at the arrows that had pierced it. Christopher, Lex, and I were in the trees some distance away, watching the struggle. My bow was in my hands, and another arrow sat loosely on its string, charged with mana.

My plan worked. Gai could cancel mana, but he couldn’t stop physics.

If I charged my arrows with more power and speed at a distance, even if the mana in the arrows disappeared, the act that moved them would still remain. It meant I couldn’t use the Heavenly style and expect results, as the power within the arrows was the result of putting mana in the arrows themselves. But the Warring style didn’t have that restriction. Using it on a bow made me fire faster, which, in turn, increased the overall stopping power of the arrows.

Stopping Faragore’s mana was another crucial component. It could heal, and it weakened its defenses, as I observed during our initial fight. In theory, we could pick at it from a distance and keep ungaging it until we killed it, or it was weak enough to slaughter close up.

“Great.” Lex leaped from the trees. “Going to help Gai now.”

“Keep him from dying,” I called to her as she landed on the ground below.

“Always.” She sprinted in Gai’s direction without giving us another glance.

“Yen,” Christopher called out to me. “Here.”

I put my bow and arrows into my codex, then held out my hand as Christopher tossed me the spear Baron Thorpe gave him. It was made from the parts of a Dread Tier Aberrant named Druvortih that could create copies of itself. We were facing a regular Dread Tier at the moment. It put into context how powerful the people who killed Druvortih were, how much respect Christopher demanded from the political community, how expensive that spear was to make, and how much Baron Thorpe was willing to invest in Sandy Branch, me, and Christopher in order to take over Zalevet.

Seemed like such a waste as I held the spear in my hand.

The weapon had a sharp, blade-like head, a solid handle, good leather lining the middle, and a Pristine mana crystal in the middle of the grip. The last time I’d used it, I’d made thousands of spears appear in the sky. None of that would matter now, though. As soon as the spear entered Gai’s mana zone, they would disappear.

“It’s your spear,” I said, offering to throw it back. “Besides, we can’t use it.”

“I never gave it a name, and always intended to give it to you when I could.” Christopher looked at the spear, sighed, then looked at me. “There is very little I can do for you anymore, Yen. My political connections don’t matter. I’m not great at any fighting style. My spells are basic. My eyes are green.” He laughed at himself. “I want to help you. Giving you that is the only thing I can think of.” He looked me dead in the eyes. “You need it more than me. I always knew that. It’s why I never named it. Take it.”

I stared back at him. My gaze then drifted back to the spear. Something caught my eye on the handle. It looked like there was a piece of string tied at the bottom. “What’s this?” I asked.

“To retrieve it,” said Nigel. “I tried adding to it while I was practicing. The wire is coated with mana. You can control the length based on how much mana you feed it. Make it longer or retract it. Wire length won’t go away even if the mana’s cut off. You just won’t be able to change it.” The thing’s made for throwing. I wanted a way to improve that concept. This was my idea.”

“Ah.”

“And it’s not useless right now,” said Christopher. He looked at Faragore, who was roaring and smashing nearby trees in agony. It didn’t care about anyone around it. It just wanted to stop the pain it felt. “The spear you duplicate will disappear, but not the original.”

My eyes widened as his words dawned on me. “You’re a genius.”

“Ha…sure…”

I leapt over to the tree Christopher was on, kissed his cheek, then leaned off until I was falling backward to the ground.

“I’ll call it…” I paused. “I’ll come back to that later!”

My feet hit the ground, and I turned, running at Faragore. It was starting to regain its footing and adjust to its pain. Raw mana coursed through me. I allowed it to drip into my spear. The Pristine crystal hungrily drank my offer as the crystal turned white.

I threw the spear.

It split into fifty copies that darted at the same speed. The wire around my wrist duplicated as well. I allowed it to elongate.

I yanked up my wrist. The sea of spears went up as well, ready to land on their prey like a massive meat tenderizer.

Faragore noticed this and looked up. It tried to fire miasma at it, but Gai was still within range with his mana field, though hidden. Faragore noticed this, and looked around for him. When it didn’t find Gai, it looked at me and roared, charging in my direction.

I slammed my hand down.

The sea of spear darted right at Faragore’s head.

It kept charging me.

As soon as they speared entered the zone, forty-nine of them disappeared. One lone spear, with all my power behind it, punched down. The tip of it jammed right through Faragore’s back shoulder and through its breast.

The monster screamed.

I yanked on the spear. It pulled easily from its flesh. The giant wound did not heal. Blood poured, and the creature’s screams dusted the air.

“Oh, I’m gonna kill it,” I said, licking the top part of my lip. “Wouldn’t selling this piece of shit help the village get by for a while? Even if this part of the forest loses a mana source?” I wondered out loud. “Can we really leave it alone?”

“All I care about is not dying at this point,” admitted Lex. She was beside Gai, hiding amongst the trees. “Do what you need to do, but my original point still stands. Killing it will change the forest forever.”

The spear returned to my hand. I snatched it out of the air. The thick slap of leather against my palm dented the air. “We’ll see what happens.”

Faragore’s attention was entirely on me. It gave Christopher the chance to slip in and sneak away our unconscious friends. It felt gross to use them as bait, but it ultimately paid off. We wouldn’t tell them about it when they woke up. Probably for the best.

Faragore grabbed a nearby tree root and pulled it out of the ground, using its physical strength alone. The tree it was connected to got shredded by the force. Along with the root came a section of tree, but not the whole tree. But it was still enough to scare the crap out of me.

Faragore swung it in my direction like a whip. It was easily double my body length in width, and long enough to reach me, even with the gap between me and the monster.

Wind energy darted into my feet. I kicked with the right one, narrowly avoiding the attack.

The bark slapped the ground. It cut into the dirt as easily as a blade and shattered the rocks and branches unfortunate enough to be in its path.

But it left an opening.

I lifted my Arcwork spear again, and prepared to throw it at—

Faragore whipped its weapon sideways right at me.

The attack was fast—too fast.

I only had enough time to pull up my spear and surge mana into it via the Heavenly style to strengthen the weapon.

Impact.

I was sent flying at an angle.

My back smashed against branches—large and small—as I coasted into the air. It felt like every bone in my torso was cracked by that single attack.

I allowed the wind to wrap around me like I’d done earlier. It slowed my pace dramatically until I was aloft in the sky, drifting and steady.

“White eyes really don’t mean shit, huh?” I grumbled. Every fight I’d taken part in, I’d gotten my ass kicked. Even fighting Gai and Lex, I’d sacrificed my hand, and they barely tried. It was a psychotic move on my end to gain the upper hand. It worked. But it was a large sacrifice.

It made one thought run through my head.

I’m so weak.

Pity sifted through my gut for a brief moment.

“Get back down here, you lazy bitch!” I heard Gai scream below. “Jerk off in your own free time!”

My eyebrow twitched. The stupidity of his words was enough to jolt me back to reality.

I dart down to the ground.

Faragore was smashing and tossing trees at Gai as he and Lex ran away from the deer-skulled monster. Its lumbering, hairy body was still ripe with red, angry wounds. Gai still had his mana depletion running, thankfully.

This counts as momentum. I realized as I was flying. I’m going as fast, if not faster, than just running. I primed my spear to throw. And gravity’s on my side.

I threw the spear.

A crackling sound tingled in the air as it blasted from my hand.

The spear hit Faragore in the middle of its torso, blasted through, and pierced the ground just between Lex and Gai.

My eyes widened. “Shit!”

Lex and Gai both fell to the ground and scattered away. They stared at my spear, then looked up at me, pissed and relieved.

Faragore was in shock, it seemed. Its hands grabbed at the wire leading from my spear to my hand. It seemed to wonder why it was in pain.

I yanked back on the spear to loosen it from the ground. It popped into the air. With a flick of my wrist, I created a wave with the wire. It floated a bit. I yanked back toward me. The spear lunged back at Faragore and pierced it in the leg.

“This’ll probably work,” I muttered as I took off, as fast as I could, in the opposite direction of the battlefield.

I felt an enormous tug in my arm that halted me in mid-air. It felt like the circulation in my arm, with the string wrapped around it from my armpit to my palm, would sever. But there was relief.

On the ground, Faragore was in the air. It had flipped. I did that.

I pulled again. The spear came loose. I yanked again, and it was coming back in my direction. I snatched it out of the air.

Faragore was suspended upward. Its back was about to his the ground.

I zoomed toward it at high speeds, spear primed, and threw it right at its head.

BOOM!

The impact of the spear created a dust cloud, sending the clearing afloat with grainy particles that coated the entire area. I couldn’t see whether I’d succeed or lose.

Suddenly, I felt a yank.

A pocket appeared due to sudden movement below. I could see Faragore.

It had used its arm to divert the spear from its head. It had entered its hand, traveled all the way down, and poked out below its tricep by its armpit.

Faragore’s other hand was on the string.

How smart is this thing?!

It yanked again, this time much harder. Even with wind wrapped around my body, Faragore was stronger. It yanked half a tree apart from the roots with one hand. It shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did.

Soon, I was plummeting to the ground.

Shit!

I killed my wind and fired an enormous blast of concentrated fire to my right. It sent me off into the tree, far away from Faragore. I crashed through some branches before reactivating my wind around my body. It slowed my descent, but not enough to avoid hitting the ground.

My left shoulder smashed against the dirt first. I heard it crack, and pain flooded my body. I didn’t really have time to dwell on it as my head slammed against a root. It bent one of my horns, causing it to partially rip out of my forehead. Part of my scalp was on fire. I swear, I heard my flesh tear.

Then, the rest of my body hit the ground. It hurt, but the agony in my arm and head stunted whatever pains I may have felt elsewhere.

“Nhgggh! Ahhhh!” I screamed. Rolling over to my stomach, I grabbed my horn. Or tried to. I tried to use my left arm on my left horn, but it didn’t react. I looked at it, my heart racing and blood streaming down my face, partially blinding me. It dangled. The shoulder looked dented. It was crushed.

Panicking, I reached up to my head with my other hand to assess the damage. My finger reached a little short, and I felt something smooth underneath my blood. Bone.

My stomach lurched. The totality of the injuries loomed in my mind, and I vomited right in front of me.

Then, bliss.

My one remaining horn started drinking in the environment. The cuts on my body mended. My bones straightened and strengthened.

Reactively, I grabbed my left horn and pushed it down. It was essentially a crooked bone hanging from a flap of flesh. I mashed it against my head. Instantly, mana surged to the spot and reconnected the flesh. Soon, that horn was drinking in mana, too.

Euphoria blessed my achy body. Every wound disappeared. All my exhaustion was replaced with ecstasy.

“Ahhh!” I cooed into the air. My gaze shifted to Faragore. “You’re—”

My mana disappeared.

The good feelings left my body.

Faragore was standing over me, its hand primed to hurt me. It had wrenched the spear out of its arm and thrown it far away. A cavity of gore spilled out of it as it primed itself to hurt me.

“Yen!” Gai shouted. “Watch out!” I don’t know how long he was screaming. His voice sounded hoarse. Lex was screaming, too. How had I not noticed them?

Faragore grabbed the side of my face with its clawed hand. Four of the fingers ground into the side of my head. The fifth, its thumb, penetrated right into my eyeball.

I couldn’t even scream.

The world split into darkness and blood. It felt like the left side of my face was being disconnected from the rest of the world.

Instinctively, my hands latched onto Faragore. I snatched and clawed at it, hoping to get free. Blood and foamy spit rattled from the sides of my mouth as I screamed for it to let me go.

Then, my mana came back to me.

But Faragore’s miasma came back as well.

It didn’t matter. The string to the Arcwork spear cinched at my will and slid into my hand. I jabbed it right into Faragore’s arm as I channelled the Heavenly style into it. The entire spear went bright white and pierced through its arm.

Faragore let me go. I scrambled back on the ground to create some distance.

My wounds began to heal.

Mana stopped again.

“Leave it!” I shouted.

“But—“

I looked in the general direction I heard Gai so he could see my face. “I SAID LEAVE IT!”

My mana returned.

The wounds on my face healed as my horns greedily drank in mana again.

I waited for the darkness on my left side to fade.

But it didn’t.

It just didn’t.

Scared, I touched my face. The entire side had healed, but a hole remained where my eye once was. No damage. No pain. Just emptiness.

I lost my eye. I realized. My stomach lurched. I looked up at Faragore. It had successfully removed my spear and tossed it far into the forest. This shitty prick destroyed my fucking eye!

Venomous anger like I’d never felt before trickled down my neck. The poisonous feeling made my mana feel angry and cloudy.

I pointed up.

The spear darted into the sky quicker than a blink.

With all the mana I could muster, I made it copy itself over and over again.

The forest had cleared from out battle. The sunlight was shining on us.

Until it began to fade.

And then it was cloudy.

Then it was dark.

Thousands of spears covered the sky, as if every bird on the planet had congregated overhead.

Sensing the change, Faragore looked up.

I pointed down.

The spears, in a stead tunneld of mana-infused steel, poured onto Faragore’s head.

The world seemed to halt just before impact.

Then they hit.

The spears swallowed Faragore.

My brain trembled as I focused all my power on those spears and on that one tiny spot, unrelenting. Seconds passed. Then minutes. Longer. Even longer. I didn’t stop. I kept going, and going, and going, until I thought it would die.

It needed to die.

I released the spears in time, exhausted and angry.

A massive hole sat where Faragore once was. I lumbered over to it and looked down. The hole was deep, dark, and filled with spears.

I released my mana, and they all disappeared.

At the bottom, Faragore was lying flat on the ground. It had multiple puncture wounds on its back and was dripping blood. But it wasn’t dead. In fact, it seemed to notice my presence and look up.

We stared at each other.

Faragore walked forward and slammed one hand into the dirt. Then another. It pried itself upward. Its foot came next. Then it’s other. Slowly, it began to climb.

I opened both my palms, pointed them down, and poured fire out of my hands straight into the pit.

I didn’t stop for minutes, sure it was getting cooked.

Not until a massive, furry hand jolted out of the fire and lunged at me.

Cursing, I leapt back, narrowly avoiding losing a limb.

Faragore had climbed out of the hole.

“DIE ALREADY!” I screamed at it.

Faragore wobbled in our direction. Even though it wasn’t dead, I had done some damage. There were burn marks all over its body. Even though it was healing, it was a slow process compared to the other times. It must have been healing the whole way up.

“This is the best chance you’ll get!” I heard Lex scream through the trees. Bolts of snake-like air darted from the trees. They thumped into Faragore. They were attacked, but it would normally have shaken off. This time, each one sent it staggering until it was forced to take a full step back. It nearly fell into the hole again.

“Fine!” I lifted my arms. With a flick of my wrist, my Arcwork spear was back in my hand. I let it float, and a hundred copies appear around me. “Back into the hole! We’ll see if you can drown next!”

Faragore stared at me. Its eyeless face held no emotions, or so I thought. Then it…shuddered?

Groaning, Faragore turned around. It began to shuffle away deep into the forest.

“Are you…running?” I whispered. “After all this?” I gritted my teeth so hard that I think I heard a crack. “BULLSHIT! COME BACK HERE AND DIE, YOU PRICK!”

I took a step forward, but stumbled. Instantly, I hit the ground. But it didn’t stop my shouting.

“I WILL CUT OFF YOUR ARM AND EAT IT! I DON’T CARE HOW LONG IT TAKES! I WILL MAKE YOU WATCH!” I cried. “AND WHEN IT’S GONE AND I’VE SHIT IT OUT, I’LL TAKE OUT YOUR EYE AND FEED IT TO YOU! YOU PIECE OF SHIT! GIVE ME BACK MY EYE!”

“Yen.” Christopher knelt near me and touched my head.

“Don’t touch me!” I twisted toward him and looked up. “Look what it did to me!”

Christopher said nothing. He just grabbed my hand. “Calm down. Take a deep breath.”

“I—”

“You’re hyperventilating. Calm down.”

I tried, but my breath was ragged. My hand went to my throat, but it didn’t stop me. It only made me hurt.

“I could knock her out,” suggested Lex. She was standing over me.

Christopher glared at Lex.

“Don’t give me that look. It’s not like you helped her any,” she grunted. Lex knelt before me. “That was the best possible outcome. You put the fear of the Gods into it, and didn’t destroy a miasma source for this forest. That was a miracle.”

“It took my fucking eye!” I shouted.

Lex pursed her lips. She was silent for a moment before saying, “You’d probably look good with an eyepatch.”

It was such a stupid statement, I stopped hyperventilating and shouting. I just stared at her.

Lex patted my head and stood up. “You’re welcome.” She looked around the area. “Gods, you’re amazing. That was a sight to behold.” She scratched her head. “Shit, we could have planned this better.”

“I don’t think I needed to shut off our mana as much as I did,” said Gai. His voice and tone were unnaturally muted. Looking at him, he seemed like a child freshly scolded by his parents.

“We all thought we were going to die. It was the best we could do,” Christopher said.

“You’d know best about that,” muttered Gai. He looked between me and Christopher. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” grunted Christopher. “Shut up.”

The adrenaline that had kept me going sapped away. My horns were no longer pulling in mana. Exhaustion caught up to me, and I fell forward.

“I won’t pass out,” I said out loud.

“Why? Who cares?” whispered Christopher.

“Because I keep passing out after every major fight,” I complained. “I’m not doing it again!” I felt a tear run out of my only eye. “I’m so weak.”

Christopher stared at me blankly. “What does that make us?”

“Weaker,” said Lex.

Christopher slowly picked me up and put me on his back.

“Now we have five people to carry,” said Gai. His usually cocky tone was returning.

“At least we’re not being chased,” said Lex. “I have something in my codex for carrying bodies. It’ll work on these guys until they wake up. I’m not waiting for it to happen organically. I’ve seen enough of this forest for a while.”

“Hear, hear,” I muttered.

As we prepared to leave, I closed my right eye and left my left one open. There was only darkness. Even as I fiddled around the edges of the hole, blinked, quietly prayed—my eye was gone.

I’d nearly lost my life mere moments ago, and I’d be forever impaired from that fight.

And in only a matter of days, an archdevil would arrive on our shores.

I wasn’t sure what was going to happen before, but I was confident I could fight if needed.

Now, I wasn’t even sure if that was true.

I was more scared than I’d ever been before.

But I didn’t show it.

No one knew except for me.

It was my burden to bear.