I pushed myself off the wall, taking a quick moment to scan the surrounding area with [OWN]. I didn’t see any soldiers in my immediate surroundings, but if I wasn’t careful I could easily be spotted and then get myself surrounded again.
I let out a soft sigh as I started to play my next few steps. I’d broken line of sight, that was a great start. Now I just needed to go the rest of the way.
I’d had to make a pretty big detour away from the path I was planning on following. I wanted to get out on the side that put me closest to running back down the path towards Seltas, but maybe it’d be better to go out the opposite side and then once I had freedom of movement make my way around the gorge and continue from there.
I sat there for a moment, my minds whirling a mile a second coming up with plans, throwing them away, coming up with new plans, refining them, and then throwing them away as well.
I was essentially stalled. Looking at my surroundings, they didn’t know where I was but they had the entire area surrounded to the point that it’d be hard to go anywhere without being spotted and just as hard to try and break through any of the groups roaming around.
I didn’t see any of the cell block leaders anywhere yet, thankfully. But it was only a matter of time before any one of them showed up. I wasn’t interested in trying to squeeze past one of them either, I was already in a shit spot. I didn’t need one of them making it even worse.
I paced back and forth in the narrow passage I was in as my minds raced, trying to possibly come up with a solution. But no matter how hard I thought I was pulling blanks. There were too many soldiers to try and stealth this, I basically had to go loud. But if I went loud then that pulled all the soldiers to my location and made it even harder to get anywhere.
I slowly got more and more frustrated, my time was dwindling out and I couldn’t come up with a plan to save my life. The biggest problem I had right now was that I was hard-limited on the skills that I could use. If I tried to use any attack skills, the towers would immediately retaliate with deadly precision and lethal force.
I had managed to dodge one of them, just barely. I wasn’t exactly keen on trying to dance with death at the moment.
Fear and anger slowly started to seep into my mind. I could see them narrowing the search parties, slowly cutting off the avenues I had. Unknowingly surrounding my hiding spot.
I wanted to scream and hit something. What was I supposed to do in this situation? How was I supposed to be able to come out on top? How did I win an unwinnable situation?
A nauseatingly overwhelming feeling of anxiety built up in the pit of my stomach. I could barely stand up straight, I felt like I was going to hurl the contents of my stomach out onto the floor.
The walls of the rock passage felt like they were closing in around me, the edges of my visions tinged black as I struggled to breathe. I felt like I was being crushed under the weight of an ocean.
I couldn’t go back. I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t.
I grabbed fistfuls of my hair and started pulling on it in frustration as my minds bounced around frantically, struggling to work cohesively, each one thinking a completely different thought and getting completely overwhelmed in their own brand of fear.
I took a deep, shaky breath and pushed myself off the wall. I wouldn’t go back. Never again, not if I could help it.
I wouldn’t let Lurks hold power over me.
I couldn’t.
I was going to have to go loud. There were no good options for me, so I just had to take the one that didn’t limit me and allowed me to get full access to all of my abilities regardless of what position that left me in.
I sprinted out of the cavern and immediately made my way towards the opposite side of the entrance to the gorge. I’d go the opposite way, there were slightly fewer guards this way, and it was less defended on top of there being few guards.
Fewer towers at the very least.
I sprinted at my maximum speed, exiting the cave in a flash of lightning, sparks bursting off my body and legs and erupting from where my feet met the ground.
I was spotted almost immediately, I heard yelling and saw the soldiers pointing me out to their friends as I sped by. [OWN] gave me an idea of their movements, allowing me to start plotting a path.
I kept up the same tactics I had been, setting traps with [Wood Manipulation] in conjunction with my nature class. I started designating points out of sight with [Conductor Points]. Once again I was extremely grateful that it didn’t cost anything in upkeep to just leave them sitting.
Instinctively I knew that it would cost more to channel a larger distance between the two points than it would for a shorter distance. It also wouldn’t work if there was something like a wall in the way. So I couldn’t use it to phase through walls.
I had a feeling I might be able to do it through walls the attack would break, but now wasn’t the time to be trying to experiment with my skills.
I placed some out of sight from prying eyes. They made a little bit of noise, but given the noise levels of the gorge right now, it would be hard to pick out.
They were more likely to see the light than anything else. I designated dozens of points, I had a plan. I was going to start making my way towards the main entrance and then I would backtrack using [Conductor Points] once I had significantly led them away. From there I would make my way outside and I’d use [Chain Lightning] to cover massive swathes of distance quickly.
It was the best plan I could come up with at the moment. Given that I had come up with it on the fly I was quite proud of it. My minds slowly set itself in place, coming down from the high tension of panic and anxiety they were feeling. They focused with laser-like intensity on my movements and the movements of the soldiers around me.
Several soldiers managed to quickly catch up with me despite my best efforts. I reacted quickly, bringing my sword up to exchange blows with them. Our blades flashed with blinding speed, I parried with my dagger and was about to cut into one of the soldiers when his friend stepped in and I was forced to move or lose my good arm.
I threw up several barriers and immediately started running again and tried to trip them up with the tendrils. But like the wind bitch from before, they easily danced through the obstacles, barely losing speed as they chased after me. I kept laying more and more points with my skill as I raced around the gorge.
I slowly was angling myself towards the entrance, and I was making good progress. Although the soldiers were starting to converge on my location from all angles.
As it stood, I wasn’t going to get as close to the entrance as I would’ve liked before I ended up getting trapped and surrounded. I would push through and get as close as I could though, for every moment I delayed, for every soldier I gathered and got to follow me, that was one more that wouldn’t be behind me when I tried to make my escape.
At the end of the day though, getting trapped and surrounded in a corner wasn’t what I was concerned about. I was more concerned about the fact that I still didn’t see any of the cell block leaders.
Where the hell were they? Why hadn’t they come out? I didn’t like it.
I lunged to the side, sliding on the rocky ground as I barely dodged an arrow that passed through where my head had been not even a full second before. My eyes instantly snapped to where the arrow had come from.
Up above, on one of the spotlight towers, there was a lone archer.
They had to be at least two miles away! How the hell were they that accurate? I ignored it and dipped down a pathway that led me into a squad, but kept me out of sight of the archer. I hadn’t wanted to go this way, but the other option was continuing to deal with the archer and eventually running into a squad anyway. This way, at least, it was on my own terms.
Unfortunately, the wind bitch was in this group as well.
She launched forward with a burst of wind at her back, laughing loudly.
“I was hoping I’d get you before everyone else did! It’ll be a cold day in hell before I let anyone else kill you, now stand and fight!” She roared as she slammed into me.
A hurricane-level force of winds ripped at my clothing and hair. I barely managed to keep her from decapitating me with that first swing.
If there was one thing I was lucky about, going down this path. It was just barely out of sight of any of the towers. Normally I wouldn’t risk the chance that they could attack me around the walls, but I didn’t really have a choice. If I wanted to live beyond the next few moments I needed to fight with everything that I had.
Lightning exploded off of me, causing the wind bitch to bounce back.
I lunged towards her casting [Chain Lightning] out of a tendril in the ground from behind her, she smoothly stepped out of the way with preternatural grace and stanced herself in preparation as I slammed into her from the front.
Our blades met with thunderous force. And then she easily overpowered me, pushing me back and unleashing a quick flurry of blows that were most definitely skill-enhanced. I activated [Second Strike] using the cross swing from the skill to block some of the attacks where I could.
Roots sprung out of the ground in an attempt to [Bind] her. And once again she just moved around them, like she could read my mind. I would think that was what would be happening if I didn’t know better.
Soldiers started closing in from every direction and causing a growl to build up deep in my throat. I hadn’t wanted to get trapped here, not yet. There were still too many soldiers on the fringe of the groups. I needed them to compact more and get closer to my spot so that when I crossed the massive distance of trails I had left with [Conductor Points] they wouldn’t be able to react quickly to my escape.
I slapped down two more [Conductor Points], one behind me and one at the opposite end of the area we were fighting in, where the next intersection of pathways sat.
I then threw up more barriers to try and slow down the blue-eyes white wind demon. I didn’t really expect them to slow her down all that much, but it didn’t even really slow down the squad that was running behind her. She launched herself over the barriers with a burst of wind.
Looking at her arc, she planned to land in front of me, trying to cut off my escape path. I smirked.
I slid to a stop as she landed in front of me, I was still smiling though. My designated point sat directly in front of me, right where I wanted it to be.
“Why the smug face?” She asked as she stepped forward.
“You’re really strong, I don’t know that I can beat you in a fight,” I started, I made sure to keep an eye on her squad that came up behind me and the separate group that came up behind her, surrounding us.
She just shrugged, “That’s to be expected, honestly. I’m a tier above you. No matter how strong you are, there are just some gaps you can close easily.”
I nodded in agreement, “You’re correct, and that’s your problem.”
Her eyes sharpened as she looked at me, slowly catching on that there was a game I was playing. My smile just grew wider.
“You keep thinking I’m trying to fight you fair and square, when really, all I’m doing, is just trying to escape you.”
She didn’t grace that with a retort and just lunged at me with frightening speed that was even greater than what she had shown me so far.
Unfortunately for her, it still wasn’t fast enough to keep me from activating my two skills in retaliation.
Lightning exploded between the two points and I easily slipped into the stream, blasting through the squad that was to my back in the way I had been initially trying to run.
Several of the soldiers hadn’t been able to move out of the way fast enough and were shocked by their troubles. The skill did decent damage, but it honestly paled in comparison to [Chain Lightning]. Honestly, most of my skills didn’t do the same level of damage that it did.
I began running again, coming into sight of another of the towers. I kept an eye on it, prepared to activate [Dodge] if I needed to, but my worries ended up being in vain. The tower remained inert, other than the morbid red glow it had in its alert mode.
I kept sprinting, my breath starting to come in heavy pants as I was starting to get winded. I had been running and fighting, almost, non-stop for… I didn’t even know how long at this point. I didn’t have time to count either.
I took another turn. Looking behind me showed the soldiers were hot on my tail, if I slowed for even a second, they’d be on me and I’d be struggling to fight them off. One more turn would put me on the path to the trail to the gorge entrance. Looking in front of me there was a barricade of soldiers.
This was what I was looking for. I was close enough to the entrance that I would have most of the soldiers in my position as they started to get nervous that I would find a way to squeeze past them. Completely unaware of my plan to completely dip back to the other side of the gorge in a single moment.
I placed another few [Conductor Points] in my path to finish out the line before I slid to a stop in front of the barricade in front of the soldiers. I took up a defensive stance, tendrils of wood exploding out of the ground all around me coated in lightning. I also threw up a myriad of barriers in different positions. My minds immediately tracked all of it and kept tabs on everything positions, already coming up with plans of action on how best to utilize the terrain and lethal labyrinth I had created.
Several of the soldiers immediately dove into the death trap. I bounced around everything with precision, attacking from angles they weren’t prepared for. Several of my attacks were lethal, notifications springing up in my mind to signify the deaths of a few of the soldiers.
Others reacted with ridiculous speed, twisting out of the way of my attacks and retaliating with fury.
I constantly had to replace the barriers I placed as they broke under attacks from the soldiers. I blocked attacks and sent more back from various directions. I cared not for how much mana I was burning at the moment.
Over and over, I twirled through attacks, constantly launching my own. Lightning and wood clad my form, instinctively reacting to my desires. The elements reacted far faster than they ever had before, with more precision, and more lethality. Just… more.
With the speed I was moving with, everything just seemed to fit together. I could see an attack coming before it was even launched and I would react accordingly to maximize the benefit of dodging the attack.
The soldiers struggled to keep up with me, they struggled to work together, the effect exacerbated by my death trap that they were running into. I felt like I could keep this up all day! I let out a round of raucous laughter as I blasted through the nearest opponent, trading several lightning-quick attacks with him before twirling my sword around his to knock it to the ground. I reached out to cut his throat with the crude dagger I had made, causing him to duck under the attack only for him to duck into a [Chain Lightning] that crashed straight into his face.
I spared no hesitation stabbing downwards into his chest killing him.
I felt like I could keep this up all day. The reality however was much more grim. I was running out of mana.
I jumped backward, dodging out of the way of a blast of cutting scythes of winds that exploded outwards from where I had just been standing.
I looked up, and there was the wind bitch, she was glaring at me, her eyes glowing an ominous blue-green hue.
She pointed her sword at me, and used a skill to carry her words toward me, “Fight me, elf.”
I stood up straight, dropping my stance, and turned to look at her.
“Will I get a chance to recover my mana and stamina and if I win will I be allowed to go free?”
She frowned, her glare intensifying at my question.
“Like hell, even if I could grant that I wouldn’t.”
I just snorted, “Then why the hell would I ever fight you in fair combat?”
Her face transformed into a rictus of rage. She moved so quickly that I didn’t even see her move.
I hadn’t even realized she had moved until the explosion of wind reached my face and my wooden arm dropped to the ground.
My blood ran cold. I knew she had been holding back. But that was insane. There was no way in hell I was beating her in a fair fight.
I slowly turned around to see her standing there facing me.
“You will fight me, or you will die like a dog,” Her voice was cold and monotone as she spoke.
I stood there staring at her for a moment. I set my jaw stubbornly.
I had overstayed my welcome, I needed to leave. Now.
“No. I won’t,” I retorted.
I exploded into lightning, expending large amounts of mana to activate every point between where I was standing all the way back to the other end of the gorge.
I covered the distance in a few seconds miles of distance eaten up in the blink of an eye. I immediately started creating barriers and bounded upwards coming out over the top of the gorge on the level where the walls were.
I was extremely close to one of the walls now. I landed on the ground and quickly scanned the area with [OWN], no soldiers. At least not terribly close. They would see my lightning going over the wall, but that was to be expected.
I turned around and started sprinting towards the wall as I got close to the wall I raised my arm, aiming to shoot out [Chain Lightning].
A foot suddenly planted itself in my path causing me to trip. I tumbled across the ground and managed to place my remaining arm underneath me and use the momentum to spring myself back onto my feet and slide to a stop, looking in the direction the foot had come from.
There wasn’t anyone there.
A hand landed on my shoulder.
“Where were you planning on going, pet?”
My blood turned to ice.
Fear overwhelmed my entire mind causing it to shut down, I managed to slowly turn to see the person who spoke with Lurks’ voice.
Except I couldn’t recognize the person. The only reason I even knew they were there was because they were holding me. I recognized the voice, but my eyes slid right over the form, like how your brain ignores the fact that it can actually see your nose. My brain just refused to acknowledge the person in front of me, they remained just a smudge in my awareness.
I felt Lurks slimy tendrils of thought cover my mind and they twisted something. Her form slowly started to fade into view. Fear and dread set in my stomach as the realization set in. She’d been watching the entire time, she could feel me the entire time.
She could hold my mind from anywhere in the gorge, trying to escape had been pointless, she had known what I was going to do the instant I decided to do it.
Tears welled up in my eyes, I wanted to fight her, to struggle despite knowing how pointless it was. But my own traitorous minds kept me from acting out, instead convincing me to remain placid and complacent. To minimize whatever punishment I had surely earned from her.
“Normally I would just execute you…” She said, letting the threat hang in the air as the soldiers slowly started to converge on our position.
“I told you that I was going to savor you. Savor the moment you break, the moment you completely give in and surrender. I plan to keep that promise. Which is why I won’t kill you. Not yet.”
She smiled, if I didn’t know better I would’ve said it was a caring smile. But I knew that she was just doing it to disarm my emotions before her next words that would surely crush my soul.
I knew what they were before she even said them. I had heard them before for similar actions in the past.
“However, there still needs to be a punishment for what you just did.”
Despair set into my bones.
I didn’t even try to fight her as she took control and made me walk behind her.
I pushed myself off the wall, taking a quick moment to scan the surrounding area with [OWN]. I didn’t see any soldiers in my immediate surroundings, but if I wasn’t careful I could easily be spotted and then get myself surrounded again.
I let out a soft sigh as I started to play my next few steps. I’d broken line of sight, that was a great start. Now I just needed to go the rest of the way.
I’d had to make a pretty big detour away from the path I was planning on following. I wanted to get out on the side that put me closest to running back down the path towards Seltas, but maybe it’d be better to go out the opposite side and then once I had freedom of movement make my way around the gorge and continue from there.
I sat there for a moment, my minds whirling a mile a second coming up with plans, throwing them away, coming up with new plans, refining them, and then throwing them away as well.
I was essentially stalled. Looking at my surroundings, they didn’t know where I was but they had the entire area surrounded to the point that it’d be hard to go anywhere without being spotted and just as hard to try and break through any of the groups roaming around.
I didn’t see any of the cell block leaders anywhere yet, thankfully. But it was only a matter of time before any one of them showed up. I wasn’t interested in trying to squeeze past one of them either, I was already in a shit spot. I didn’t need one of them making it even worse.
I paced back and forth in the narrow passage I was in as my minds raced, trying to possibly come up with a solution. But no matter how hard I thought I was pulling blanks. There were too many soldiers to try and stealth this, I basically had to go loud. But if I went loud then that pulled all the soldiers to my location and made it even harder to get anywhere.
I slowly got more and more frustrated, my time was dwindling out and I couldn’t come up with a plan to save my life. The biggest problem I had right now was that I was hard-limited on the skills that I could use. If I tried to use any attack skills, the towers would immediately retaliate with deadly precision and lethal force.
I had managed to dodge one of them, just barely. I wasn’t exactly keen on trying to dance with death at the moment.
Fear and anger slowly started to seep into my mind. I could see them narrowing the search parties, slowly cutting off the avenues I had. Unknowingly surrounding my hiding spot.
I wanted to scream and hit something. What was I supposed to do in this situation? How was I supposed to be able to come out on top? How did I win an unwinnable situation?
A nauseatingly overwhelming feeling of anxiety built up in the pit of my stomach. I could barely stand up straight, I felt like I was going to hurl the contents of my stomach out onto the floor.
The walls of the rock passage felt like they were closing in around me, the edges of my visions tinged black as I struggled to breathe. I felt like I was being crushed under the weight of an ocean.
I couldn’t go back. I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t I couldn’t.
I grabbed fistfuls of my hair and started pulling on it in frustration as my minds bounced around frantically, struggling to work cohesively, each one thinking a completely different thought and getting completely overwhelmed in their own brand of fear.
I took a deep, shaky breath and pushed myself off the wall. I wouldn’t go back. Never again, not if I could help it.
I wouldn’t let Lurks hold power over me.
I couldn’t.
I was going to have to go loud. There were no good options for me, so I just had to take the one that didn’t limit me and allowed me to get full access to all of my abilities regardless of what position that left me in.
I sprinted out of the cavern and immediately made my way towards the opposite side of the entrance to the gorge. I’d go the opposite way, there were slightly fewer guards this way, and it was less defended on top of there being few guards.
Fewer towers at the very least.
I sprinted at my maximum speed, exiting the cave in a flash of lightning, sparks bursting off my body and legs and erupting from where my feet met the ground.
I was spotted almost immediately, I heard yelling and saw the soldiers pointing me out to their friends as I sped by. [OWN] gave me an idea of their movements, allowing me to start plotting a path.
I kept up the same tactics I had been, setting traps with [Wood Manipulation] in conjunction with my nature class. I started designating points out of sight with [Conductor Points]. Once again I was extremely grateful that it didn’t cost anything in upkeep to just leave them sitting.
Instinctively I knew that it would cost more to channel a larger distance between the two points than it would for a shorter distance. It also wouldn’t work if there was something like a wall in the way. So I couldn’t use it to phase through walls.
I had a feeling I might be able to do it through walls the attack would break, but now wasn’t the time to be trying to experiment with my skills.
I placed some out of sight from prying eyes. They made a little bit of noise, but given the noise levels of the gorge right now, it would be hard to pick out.
They were more likely to see the light than anything else. I designated dozens of points, I had a plan. I was going to start making my way towards the main entrance and then I would backtrack using [Conductor Points] once I had significantly led them away. From there I would make my way outside and I’d use [Chain Lightning] to cover massive swathes of distance quickly.
It was the best plan I could come up with at the moment. Given that I had come up with it on the fly I was quite proud of it. My minds slowly set itself in place, coming down from the high tension of panic and anxiety they were feeling. They focused with laser-like intensity on my movements and the movements of the soldiers around me.
Several soldiers managed to quickly catch up with me despite my best efforts. I reacted quickly, bringing my sword up to exchange blows with them. Our blades flashed with blinding speed, I parried with my dagger and was about to cut into one of the soldiers when his friend stepped in and I was forced to move or lose my good arm.
I threw up several barriers and immediately started running again and tried to trip them up with the tendrils. But like the wind bitch from before, they easily danced through the obstacles, barely losing speed as they chased after me. I kept laying more and more points with my skill as I raced around the gorge.
I slowly was angling myself towards the entrance, and I was making good progress. Although the soldiers were starting to converge on my location from all angles.
As it stood, I wasn’t going to get as close to the entrance as I would’ve liked before I ended up getting trapped and surrounded. I would push through and get as close as I could though, for every moment I delayed, for every soldier I gathered and got to follow me, that was one more that wouldn’t be behind me when I tried to make my escape.
At the end of the day though, getting trapped and surrounded in a corner wasn’t what I was concerned about. I was more concerned about the fact that I still didn’t see any of the cell block leaders.
Where the hell were they? Why hadn’t they come out? I didn’t like it.
I lunged to the side, sliding on the rocky ground as I barely dodged an arrow that passed through where my head had been not even a full second before. My eyes instantly snapped to where the arrow had come from.
Up above, on one of the spotlight towers, there was a lone archer.
They had to be at least two miles away! How the hell were they that accurate? I ignored it and dipped down a pathway that led me into a squad, but kept me out of sight of the archer. I hadn’t wanted to go this way, but the other option was continuing to deal with the archer and eventually running into a squad anyway. This way, at least, it was on my own terms.
Unfortunately, the wind bitch was in this group as well.
She launched forward with a burst of wind at her back, laughing loudly.
“I was hoping I’d get you before everyone else did! It’ll be a cold day in hell before I let anyone else kill you, now stand and fight!” She roared as she slammed into me.
A hurricane-level force of winds ripped at my clothing and hair. I barely managed to keep her from decapitating me with that first swing.
If there was one thing I was lucky about, going down this path. It was just barely out of sight of any of the towers. Normally I wouldn’t risk the chance that they could attack me around the walls, but I didn’t really have a choice. If I wanted to live beyond the next few moments I needed to fight with everything that I had.
Lightning exploded off of me, causing the wind bitch to bounce back.
I lunged towards her casting [Chain Lightning] out of a tendril in the ground from behind her, she smoothly stepped out of the way with preternatural grace and stanced herself in preparation as I slammed into her from the front.
Our blades met with thunderous force. And then she easily overpowered me, pushing me back and unleashing a quick flurry of blows that were most definitely skill-enhanced. I activated [Second Strike] using the cross swing from the skill to block some of the attacks where I could.
Roots sprung out of the ground in an attempt to [Bind] her. And once again she just moved around them, like she could read my mind. I would think that was what would be happening if I didn’t know better.
Soldiers started closing in from every direction and causing a growl to build up deep in my throat. I hadn’t wanted to get trapped here, not yet. There were still too many soldiers on the fringe of the groups. I needed them to compact more and get closer to my spot so that when I crossed the massive distance of trails I had left with [Conductor Points] they wouldn’t be able to react quickly to my escape.
I slapped down two more [Conductor Points], one behind me and one at the opposite end of the area we were fighting in, where the next intersection of pathways sat.
I then threw up more barriers to try and slow down the blue-eyes white wind demon. I didn’t really expect them to slow her down all that much, but it didn’t even really slow down the squad that was running behind her. She launched herself over the barriers with a burst of wind.
Looking at her arc, she planned to land in front of me, trying to cut off my escape path. I smirked.
I slid to a stop as she landed in front of me, I was still smiling though. My designated point sat directly in front of me, right where I wanted it to be.
“Why the smug face?” She asked as she stepped forward.
“You’re really strong, I don’t know that I can beat you in a fight,” I started, I made sure to keep an eye on her squad that came up behind me and the separate group that came up behind her, surrounding us.
She just shrugged, “That’s to be expected, honestly. I’m a tier above you. No matter how strong you are, there are just some gaps you can close easily.”
I nodded in agreement, “You’re correct, and that’s your problem.”
Her eyes sharpened as she looked at me, slowly catching on that there was a game I was playing. My smile just grew wider.
“You keep thinking I’m trying to fight you fair and square, when really, all I’m doing, is just trying to escape you.”
She didn’t grace that with a retort and just lunged at me with frightening speed that was even greater than what she had shown me so far.
Unfortunately for her, it still wasn’t fast enough to keep me from activating my two skills in retaliation.
Lightning exploded between the two points and I easily slipped into the stream, blasting through the squad that was to my back in the way I had been initially trying to run.
Several of the soldiers hadn’t been able to move out of the way fast enough and were shocked by their troubles. The skill did decent damage, but it honestly paled in comparison to [Chain Lightning]. Honestly, most of my skills didn’t do the same level of damage that it did.
I began running again, coming into sight of another of the towers. I kept an eye on it, prepared to activate [Dodge] if I needed to, but my worries ended up being in vain. The tower remained inert, other than the morbid red glow it had in its alert mode.
I kept sprinting, my breath starting to come in heavy pants as I was starting to get winded. I had been running and fighting, almost, non-stop for… I didn’t even know how long at this point. I didn’t have time to count either.
I took another turn. Looking behind me showed the soldiers were hot on my tail, if I slowed for even a second, they’d be on me and I’d be struggling to fight them off. One more turn would put me on the path to the trail to the gorge entrance. Looking in front of me there was a barricade of soldiers.
This was what I was looking for. I was close enough to the entrance that I would have most of the soldiers in my position as they started to get nervous that I would find a way to squeeze past them. Completely unaware of my plan to completely dip back to the other side of the gorge in a single moment.
I placed another few [Conductor Points] in my path to finish out the line before I slid to a stop in front of the barricade in front of the soldiers. I took up a defensive stance, tendrils of wood exploding out of the ground all around me coated in lightning. I also threw up a myriad of barriers in different positions. My minds immediately tracked all of it and kept tabs on everything positions, already coming up with plans of action on how best to utilize the terrain and lethal labyrinth I had created.
Several of the soldiers immediately dove into the death trap. I bounced around everything with precision, attacking from angles they weren’t prepared for. Several of my attacks were lethal, notifications springing up in my mind to signify the deaths of a few of the soldiers.
Others reacted with ridiculous speed, twisting out of the way of my attacks and retaliating with fury.
I constantly had to replace the barriers I placed as they broke under attacks from the soldiers. I blocked attacks and sent more back from various directions. I cared not for how much mana I was burning at the moment.
Over and over, I twirled through attacks, constantly launching my own. Lightning and wood clad my form, instinctively reacting to my desires. The elements reacted far faster than they ever had before, with more precision, and more lethality. Just… more.
With the speed I was moving with, everything just seemed to fit together. I could see an attack coming before it was even launched and I would react accordingly to maximize the benefit of dodging the attack.
The soldiers struggled to keep up with me, they struggled to work together, the effect exacerbated by my death trap that they were running into. I felt like I could keep this up all day! I let out a round of raucous laughter as I blasted through the nearest opponent, trading several lightning-quick attacks with him before twirling my sword around his to knock it to the ground. I reached out to cut his throat with the crude dagger I had made, causing him to duck under the attack only for him to duck into a [Chain Lightning] that crashed straight into his face.
I spared no hesitation stabbing downwards into his chest killing him.
I felt like I could keep this up all day. The reality however was much more grim. I was running out of mana.
I jumped backward, dodging out of the way of a blast of cutting scythes of winds that exploded outwards from where I had just been standing.
I looked up, and there was the wind bitch, she was glaring at me, her eyes glowing an ominous blue-green hue.
She pointed her sword at me, and used a skill to carry her words toward me, “Fight me, elf.”
I stood up straight, dropping my stance, and turned to look at her.
“Will I get a chance to recover my mana and stamina and if I win will I be allowed to go free?”
She frowned, her glare intensifying at my question.
“Like hell, even if I could grant that I wouldn’t.”
I just snorted, “Then why the hell would I ever fight you in fair combat?”
Her face transformed into a rictus of rage. She moved so quickly that I didn’t even see her move.
I hadn’t even realized she had moved until the explosion of wind reached my face and my wooden arm dropped to the ground.
My blood ran cold. I knew she had been holding back. But that was insane. There was no way in hell I was beating her in a fair fight.
I slowly turned around to see her standing there facing me.
“You will fight me, or you will die like a dog,” Her voice was cold and monotone as she spoke.
I stood there staring at her for a moment. I set my jaw stubbornly.
I had overstayed my welcome, I needed to leave. Now.
“No. I won’t,” I retorted.
I exploded into lightning, expending large amounts of mana to activate every point between where I was standing all the way back to the other end of the gorge.
I covered the distance in a few seconds miles of distance eaten up in the blink of an eye. I immediately started creating barriers and bounded upwards coming out over the top of the gorge on the level where the walls were.
I was extremely close to one of the walls now. I landed on the ground and quickly scanned the area with [OWN], no soldiers. At least not terribly close. They would see my lightning going over the wall, but that was to be expected.
I turned around and started sprinting towards the wall as I got close to the wall I raised my arm, aiming to shoot out [Chain Lightning].
A foot suddenly planted itself in my path causing me to trip. I tumbled across the ground and managed to place my remaining arm underneath me and use the momentum to spring myself back onto my feet and slide to a stop, looking in the direction the foot had come from.
There wasn’t anyone there.
A hand landed on my shoulder.
“Where were you planning on going, pet?”
My blood turned to ice.
Fear overwhelmed my entire mind causing it to shut down, I managed to slowly turn to see the person who spoke with Lurks’ voice.
Except I couldn’t recognize the person. The only reason I even knew they were there was because they were holding me. I recognized the voice, but my eyes slid right over the form, like how your brain ignores the fact that it can actually see your nose. My brain just refused to acknowledge the person in front of me, they remained just a smudge in my awareness.
I felt Lurks slimy tendrils of thought cover my mind and they twisted something. Her form slowly started to fade into view. Fear and dread set in my stomach as the realization set in. She’d been watching the entire time, she could feel me the entire time.
She could hold my mind from anywhere in the gorge, trying to escape had been pointless, she had known what I was going to do the instant I decided to do it.
Tears welled up in my eyes, I wanted to fight her, to struggle despite knowing how pointless it was. But my own traitorous minds kept me from acting out, instead convincing me to remain placid and complacent. To minimize whatever punishment I had surely earned from her.
“Normally I would just execute you…” She said, letting the threat hang in the air as the soldiers slowly started to converge on our position.
“I told you that I was going to savor you. Savor the moment you break, the moment you completely give in and surrender. I plan to keep that promise. Which is why I won’t kill you. Not yet.”
She smiled, if I didn’t know better I would’ve said it was a caring smile. But I knew that she was just doing it to disarm my emotions before her next words that would surely crush my soul.
I knew what they were before she even said them. I had heard them before for similar actions in the past.
“However, there still needs to be a punishment for what you just did.”
Despair set into my bones.
I didn’t even try to fight her as she took control and made me walk behind her.
