“A Seeker must never let their guard down, even once the battle is over.”

* from the writings of Rathborne of the Order of the Raven.

Wind whistled in my ears as I crashed down on the Stone Demon. I cried out as I buried my axe in its hideous back. Pustules snapped and popped, spitting green, putrid puss that struck the stone with a wet slap.

MASSIVE

120

The demon roared and spun towards me with a thick claw raised to strike, but Jacob’s Mortal Arrow struck it in the chest, temporarily interrupting the attack. I seized the opportunity for a follow-up stab that caught the demon in its guts.

67

My Rally bar was filling, and for a moment I felt confident that we would succeed.

The pain I felt as the demon cast its spell was unlike anything I’d felt before. A sizzling globe of deep flaming light crashed into my chest and slapped upwards, knocking my chin back and sending me flying backwards into the stone escarpment behind me.

-210

“Holy shit!” I heard Jacob cry out as he fired again. I couldn’t believe it either and barely managed to roll out of the way of the thing’s massive foot as it beat its wings and leapt forward in an attempt to stomp the life out of me.

I popped a Soothing Syrup, restoring 109 points of health, bringing me back to just above half, and went for another one, but there was no time. The demon’s claw caught my thigh, tore the flesh and heaved me into the air. I flapped my arms frantically, trying to right myself, but hit hard, driving my chin into the ground. My legs scorpioned up behind me and my neck felt ready to break as I finally flipped over and landed on my back.

-90

I went for a syrup, and managed to get it down, but I was in big trouble. Wincing from the pain, I staggered to my feet and instantly Shadowstepped out of the way of a double claw attack from the hideous monster. I seized the opportunity to drive my axe into its back, then swing back down again across its thick legs.

67—89

Between the two of us, we’d managed to take a third of the creature’s health off, and my Rally bar was starting to grow. If I could just avoid being hit again—

That dream was shattered as another one of its spells struck my face.

-80

Two thirds of my health was gone, as was the progress of my Rally bar. Jacob fired again, striking the demon in the side of its face. It roared and spun around to face him. I reached for a Soothing Syrup but as I brought it to my lips, I watched with horror as the horrible monster reached out a hand toward him. A shadowy purple lash whipped out of its fingertips, spit towards Jacob and coiled around his ankles like a snake.

His gasp of shock was cut short as his legs were tugged out from under him and he slammed down against the rocks before being yanked towards the demon. Breath burst from his lungs as the demon drove its fist into his chest. More than half of his health was gone in an instant, and another large chunk fell away as he hit the ground.

“Vile beast!” the witch cried out, raising a gnarled hand toward Jacob. A warm white light sped towards him, swept him up in a curled embrace and I watched as his health was completely restored. I was shocked to see such a beautiful spell emerge from such a hideous woman.

Sipping another Soothing Syrup, I ceased the opportunity and attacked. Three quick strikes had my Rally bar charging up, and I managed a fourth before the demon was able to spin around and face me. Anticipating his next attack, I let my Blunderbuss cry and scored a perfect riposte.

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Dooooommmm!

My next attack shattered his health to barely a sliver, but as I raised up for a finishing blow, the demon’s sores rippled across its body, snapped and burst, spraying a fetid sludge that struck Jacob and me, coating us in its filth.

Something flashed in the corner of my eye, and I glanced at it. A debuff.

Putrid Slime—26 Damage Per Second for 5 seconds.

“Sick!” Jacob cried out, hacking and coughing as he slipped in the foulness and collapsed into a heap.

“Vile creature!” the witch cried out again, casting some kind of attack spell that spit crimson and orange toward the demon like a snake. The demon slashed it aside with the back of its claw, sending it into the rock wall, causing an explosion of stone shards that rained down like shrapnel.

My health ticked down as I lashed out, but the demon blocked my blow, struck me in the chest and sent me tumbling backwards. As I got back to my feet, I saw the thing stomp down on Jacob with its sharp claw, picking off a huge chunk of his health. The next blow would kill him—if the Putrid Slime didn’t.

I had to act quickly to save him. I raised my Blunderbuss again and squeezed the trigger. Slugs slammed into the thing’s back, barely registering as damage, but doing enough to get his attention. He whirled and I Shadowstepped to avoid his claw, then brought my axe down in his back. The beast cried out, beat its wings in a final failed attempt at an attack, then collapsed face first against the stone.

Quintessence swirled around me, and I heard the sound of a level up. I turned and looked at the old witch, who had her hand stretched awkwardly toward me.

“The plague is over,” I told her, not knowing what else to say. “You can go back to town now.” I heard Jacob cry out behind me.

“We did it!” he shouted, getting to his feet, his health precariously low. “We did it—”

I reached down and looted the Demon, plucking something from his corpse, but before I had time to examine it, something groaned behind me—shifted like tectonic plates. I whipped around.

The spikes were enormous, thick like lances, and covered with the old bones of dead men. One pierced my stomach and the other burrowed through the one of my forehead and straight into my skull. Pain tore through me, and as darkness took me, I was barely aware of Jacob’s tortured screams.

DEATH TAKES YOU!

I couldn’t help but smile—or whatever the equivalent of smiling would be as my bodiless soul swept through the ether toward the expanding glow of the lamppost.

“You will die!”

Rey’s smiling face in my mind as she’d spoke those words to me. If she were here, she’d be all on my case for letting my guard down and falling for that trap—and she’d be right. Where was she now? The thought of her running through the world, mind seized, eyes vacant, lashing out at anyone and anything, made me sick.

The sounds of town filled my ears as the lamppost came into view and I returned to the world. I saw Jacob’s outline beginning to materialize beside me, and stared up at the full moon that seemed to bear down on me like a cold hand, Hell bent on driving me into the ground like a blunt nail.

Despite my own amusement at my stupid mistake, I was frustrated. I’d been making progress, sure, but it was slow and I was still no closer to discovering what had happened to Rey or where she was. I still had no idea about the monolith or who was behind all of this, if anyone. And somehow, being stuck here, made things so much worse.

I closed my eyes as Jacob materialized beside me, and took a deep breath.

“Damn,” Jacob sighed. “That hurt.”

“Yeah…” I muttered. The image of Rey’s body, lying motionless on her bed beneath her terrified parents, filled my mind like a dose of cold water shot straight into the hole I still felt in my skull.

I wish I was there—home…I thought.

Then—something slipped. The world shifted in a way I couldn’t explain.

The sound of wind…

…a freight train barreling down the tracks to an unknown destination…

“Rand?” It was Jacob’s voice. I knew that, but it was as though he was calling to me from a dream.

Zap! Zap!

I felt the electrical popping inside my brain that I sometimes felt at home when I tried to think of too many things at once. Was it a symptom of my epilepsy? No one knew.

I rebooted—restarted on the inside.

Zap!

A flash of light on the back of my eyelids, projected from the back of my skull.

“Rand…?” Jacob’s voice even fainter now, as though he were standing at the end of a long tunnel and only his echo was reaching me.

More wind…

“Clay!”

A sweeping sensation from within, as though I was being pulled by a string attached to a fish hook that had caught somewhere deep inside.

No!

“Claaaay!”

Disbelief as a conduit filled my inner eye…sparks and violent electricity coursing around me…

I was pulled forward, like a cold bit of ice cream sucked through a straw by an invisible giant.

Then—something soft beneath my back.

It can’t be…

But it was. I opened my eyes.