SarthDara was flying, about thirty meters off the ground where the apex of her jump had taken her. The energy that she had at her command now was more freeing than jumping off that mountain.

Rarely before had she been this energized to do anything. Sarah knew this was a game, it wasn’t real, but it felt so much more fantastic than the life she knew in reality.

That gemstone had given her levels of energy that Sarah guessed were God-tiered. The wind was as easy to ride on now as a bicycle that she had never stopped using in reality. The fire burning in her chest swelled, then compressed into her fists. This was easily four or five times the amount of fire essence beyond what she had unleashed in a giant wave before.

The last of the Mandragola, a bright orange tiger striped bulb of a plant head, was a small speck below her. Jorn, his huge weapons raised either side of him, was rushing in on it from ground level. Vines and dead corpse parts went flying as the giant man went to work hacking at the Mandragola.

The first wave of adventures had left more corpses of their own behind than any of the plant matter. Jorn made the scene look like Sarah was gazing down at a blender in motion.

His new hammer, along with the deadly ax he already had, cleared large swaths of Mandragola away. Jorn’s battle cry was clear even up as high as Sarah was. In her descent, she let out a cry of her own.

Like a hawk swooping down upon its prey, she let out a piercing scream. The fire in her fists didn’t expel away from her, but super heated her skin as she made contact with the plant head.

At first, she was going to release the energy as soon as she made contact. She had been moving far too fast, faster than she had anticipated. Now, she was already halfway into the gelatin innards of the plant. The liquid inside was clear enough that she could see the color of its outer skin reflected all around her.

And in a moment of pure clarity, she realized just how much trouble she was in.

The whole plant exploded, the plum of fire and smoke rose higher into the sky then the nearby mountains. A raging inferno radiated out from the core of the blast. SarthDarah rocketed along with it. She was surprised to find that the fire didn’t hurt, it wasn’t hot and it did not cause her to fear.

Jorn ducked under the wave of intense heat, using the crater of plant matter and body parts as a shield against the worst of it. The wave of heat was followed by a sonic boom, loud enough to cause auditory damage to his ears. Jorn howled in pain, but held his position as the plant matter vaporized around him.

Kuru watched the plume of smoke and fire rise, awed by the sheer insanity of the attack Sarah had just unleashed. That girl was reckless, but must have understood her powers clearly if she went for the Kamikaze attack. The air had super heated and condensed behind her, basically turning her body into a jet engine fired straight at the blossom. Her desire to take the girl under her wing grew even more.

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Sarah marveled at the sight, she had to be hundreds of feet up in the air, weightless and levitating just above the smoke from the explosion. Her vision blinked with a notification.

Warning, low oxygen. Elevation roughly three thousand meters, levitate ability auto engaged.

Three thousand meters?! That was as tall as some small mountain peaks! Sarah rolled over to look down at the land below. Her eyes bulged, the scarred land below was very far away. She couldn’t even make out the people still down there. The sea was clear enough to see, and the city. The city was on fire.

Sarah saw something else as she looked over the city, a long line of vehicles and marching suits of armor. There were enough of them to clearly see the line of an army marching towards the city from the north. That was an issue for later, right now, Sarah had to figure out how to get out of the sky.

Levitate ability reaching maximum duration, five seconds to disabling.

Oh, just great, SarthDarah trying to be a badass was about to get her killed.

Sarah was plummeting down, watching the ground come up towards her. It wasn’t as fast as she expected. After she ran down the mountain side when she first entered the game, this was tame. The Levitate ability that she had worked for about twenty seconds at a time. Then it seems she had to wait for about thirty seconds before she could activate it again.

Her elevation was hovering as a blinking red number off to her left. The number plummeted quickly as she fell. Just as levitate became available again, she watched her altitude close in on fifteen hundred meters. She would have to time it out, or end up too far up or splattered on the ground when she used her ability.

One thousand meters flew by, a few birds scattered as she fell through them. A feeling of complete joy was taking over. SarthDarah had never felt so alive, this body was meant to be moving at extreme speed and on the wind. The firepower was amazing, but the feeling of flying was quickly becoming more intoxicating to her.

Seven hundred and fifty meters. SarthDarah’s eyes narrowed intently on where she could see the little pricks of what had to be Jorn and the others.

“Gonna make it?” Kuru’s voice suddenly came out of nowhere, startling Sarah and breaking her concentration for a moment.

She twisted about, looking for the guild associate, but of course she wasn’t in the air with her. Sarah felt foolish for breaking her focus, and renewed her effort to land without killing herself.

“I’d rather not see you splat on the ground. If you require assistance…”

“I’m good. I’ve just about made it back. Just give me a few more seconds.” Sarah had to interrupt Kuru, she definitely didn’t need the NPC’s help out of this.

SarthDarah was the badass, and after finishing this fight, she was gonna be one of the front runners in this game. She had made up for her late start, and was gonna make sure that she left an impression on every witness. Then no one would forget who she was, and when it came time to make game changing decisions, SarthDarah would be one of the few making them.

Two hundred meters.

One hundred, fifty, thirty. Sarah’s heart raced, the ground was only a tall building away now.

Ten meters.

“Holy shit, Sarth!” Jorn yelled out as she got to five meters and still hadn’t stopped.

Three meters. Activate! SarthDarah felt her body catch for a brief instant, then all the momentum she had was gone. The wind rushed out from beneath her, pushing back scattered ashes and dirt. She was hovering, laid back as if she was relaxing on a beach somewhere, about six feet off the ground.

Jorn was a few feet away, eyes wide and arms out like he thought he was gonna have to catch her. Sarah looked over at him, winked, then flipped over so her feet landed on the ground as she canceled the levitation.