Chapter 27:

We continued to climb, scramble, slide, dodge, balance and jump through various islands, challenges and traps. Every now and again, there would be skeletons. Sometimes archers, other times Champions, or a mix of the two. Sometimes stranger - wolves, and snakes and so forth. Having to keep Boone positioned very carefully, I was reduced to only being able to fight with my Catapult and make potshots from afar. It didn't seem to matter to Mia.

Something has changed in her and her Abilities seemed to have synergized together. She didn't fight - she danced. As long as she wasn't surrounded and overwhelmed, Mia was unstoppable. Her Wood 5 Body, combined with Wood 3 Shards of Midnight would have been strong enough, but her Shaped Shadows Ability, and her Born to Shadows and Grasping Shadows Talents made her an absolute nightmare, while her enchanted armour and wings made her extremely difficult to hurt with conventional weapons.

The shadows of the arena, her opponents, the walls - anything that was an absence of light at any particular moment responded and bent to her will. Her Shards of Midnight could cut bone, and they bent and twisted and lengthened at her will, becoming whip-like, sword-like, axe-like and more. When she struck, occasionally the opponents’ own shadow would reach out and grab them, throwing off attacks or stumbling their responses, and Mia would capitalise on it.

Her dexterity had gone through a quantitative change. Before, the skeletons had always been able to power forward with amazing speed, almost too quick for me to follow. But Mia was not only faster when she fought them at normal speed, when she used her Adrenaline Surge, she became a literal blur, doubling her Body Attribute for the few seconds it was active. At one point, against three Champions, Mia activated her Surge at the same time she elongated her twin daggers into a long, two handed single edged blade, and she moved so fast that one moment she was in front of them, the next she was fifteen feet behind them and the monsters were falling to the ground, their legs cut off at the knees.

Boone was still unconscious. I had taken the opportunity when it wasn't needed to slip my tail into his makeshift sling and wrap it carefully around him. The extra physical contact helped to reassure me he was still breathing and his heart was still beating. On my shoulder, his head would occasionally twitch in his sleep, and when we weren’t in active combat, I would take the time to whisper in his ear, kiss his cheeks and rub his eyebrows - ensure that he knew he was safe and being looked after.

Mind you, I say active combat. The truth was I wasn't doing a lot right now. My projectiles were among my weakest abilities, and while I could do good damage to archers and champions' when I could hit them, against the larger opponents I was next to useless. I even started to think Kintsuji had picked the wrong horse to back. My older sister was very quickly turning into a force of nature as long as she had shadows and the freedom to move.

I pulled back on the cord of my catapult and launched a blue Foxfire imbued stone at the head of a canine skeleton. A pack of nine had assaulted us from a hidden trapdoor as we reached the bottom of a climbing wall, and while Mia was ploughing through the things, there were enough that I was having to use my very quickly dwindling supply of sling stones to help drive them back and give Mia time to do what she needed to do. The stone impacted the wolf skeleton, and did do some damage, bit at a combined damage of only Wood 5 to its level of Wood 7 - combining my Body Attribute, Foxfire Imbuement, and the catapult itself - it was only enough to stagger the monster rather than truly hurt it. My catapult was only a basic Wood 1 item after all, and I could see that a better ranged option with a more comprehensive enchantment would be something I would have to look into soon if it was a path I wanted to continue. I would have been much better with the Shining Spear or my claws, my Constellation abilities seeming to be pushing me very quickly towards a melee damage soak of ‘tank’ role, but with Boone strapped to me I don't want to risk him until he was recovered and awake - I again reluctantly thanked Kintsuji for seemingly still trying to nudge our odds in this dungeon in our favour. I had no illusions it was only because we were useful to her plans for Axis, but it still meant we were alive when by every right we shouldn't be. I wondered briefly if it would be the same for any future Aspirants who took this Trial? Would they have the benefit of Kintsuji nudging their odds, or would they be on their own?

It had been over an hour since she started this crusade, and I could see the toll was starting to bring her down. We were only a few platforms from the giant metal gates, and had maybe three or four encounters before we reached the end, but Mia was looking worn through. My sister, quite frankly, was amazing. Her skills, now they were allowed to come out of the box and bloom with her Abilities and Attributes, were on the level of a savant, frankly. Despite the skeletons she was fighting being relatively high level - all being Wood 7 creatures, Mia was fighting them on a more than equal footing. With a combination of abilities that totalled Wood 9, her strikes, when perfectly timed, would simply cut through bone like wet paper. But there was only so much a mortal could do before they were exhausted. I would have to make a decision soon. Boone had regained perhaps twenty health over the hour from being in contact with skin. This was still a huge amount, as he was relatively fragile otherwise, having only twenty five health per level, as opposed to the one hundred health per level of the Body Attribute that Mia and I received - he was basically a powerful familiar, and not a boss monster equivalent after all. The spear had been a critical hit, and had reduced him to five health in a single attack. Thankfully, I had the healing bottle. Thirty health from the first use, and very soon I would be able to use it again, plus the twenty healing from the new [Skin To Skin] upgrade would leave him at 85/125. I felt he should wake up when he healed all the way, hopefully, but that might take another couple of hours, and Mia was running out of steam fast.

The other option was to use the other part of [Skin To Skin] and sacrifice my own health to heal him back to full, then use the last charge of the healing bottle to heal myself. I could then recharge the bottle for 20% of my Essence reserves. My health would take a hit - covering that last fourth health would cost me eighty, but with the healing from the bottle I'd leave my own health at 150/200, as well as losing a chunk of my essence reserves. I could hopefully heal that with [Repletion] between fights, though, so as long as I was careful, I could stomach the damage. If I did that, I would be down a few personal resources, but Boone would recover quicker, and I could take a few of the fights for Mia. At the end of the day it was a no brainer - she needed to rest, and getting Boone back into the fight would only help multiply our combat ability in the long run. While I worked out the math, and made plans, I had continued to fire stones into the wolves, further draining my resources and bottoming out my Foxfire Imbuement, and I was running dangerously low on ammunition. That would also cost about 30% of my current reserves to refill, with my increased mind stat having lessened the cost, but not eliminated it - the only reason the Healing bottle took 20% still was that it was very inefficiency made due to my own lack of skill, and the hard limits built into the bottle.

Mia was able to polish off the wolves with a few more minutes of fighting, leaping and flipping, kicking and cutting bone to pieces, before she came to a halt in the middle of the room. Her manic, feral rictus grin that had begun to stretch her face eased back into the more familiar smile of my sister, and she let her tension drain out of her body with a deep sigh, before she came back to where Boone and I had been waiting. She looked tired - but also manic. I really didn't like the sheen in her eyes, and with every fight, it was becoming clear that, now she was not being artificially terrified, she was beginning to enjoy the fights a little too much.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Mia had been mad about training since we made a promise at 5 and 6 years old. Three years of daily, hours long combat practices and hunting trips with my father - hours more of knife work skill training that she had done in any spare minute. Constant requests for adventure stories from my family and any adventurer we met.

Mia had always been battle obsessed, and now she was getting to exercise her clear talents for combat - but shadow and darkness were clearly having some effect on her, and I didn't like even these early stages of what it might lead to. It was definitely time for me to step up and give her a break. I placed a hand on Boones’ neck and felt my way to activating the health transfer.

It was a horrid feeling. My insides suddenly seized and twisted, and I felt something vital drain away from me and through my hand. I didn't feel like it was making me injured, I felt like it was making my body weaker, literally draining away my vitality. But as Mia headed over to me, tired and worn, but with that starry eyed look strong on her face, I knew it was working. It took a few minutes, but I felt Boone stir.

Arcadia? What happened? The fox stirred on my shoulder and, upon finding himself tied to my body, began to wriggle and fidget to try and free himself.

“It's okay, Buddy. Just relax for a minute. You got hurt but we managed to fix you up. I…I had to upgrade your Talent, without being able to ask you. I'm sorry. But, it got you a healing Ability that works as long as we have skin contact.” He squirmed, and upon hearing that I'd made the decision without him, squirmed even harder.

That wasn't a decision to make for me, Arcadia. Was there no other way? He snapped at me, and bit at my fingers when I tried to pet him to calm him. His fidgeting was starting to hurt me, as his claws scrabbled across my bare back, and I had to hurry to strip out of my armour and untie the sling, lowering the fox to the floor with my tail.

“You were very nearly dead, Boone. You took a spear to the chest and it basically pulped your organs and heart. You were going to die.” Finally freed from the material, he stood to his four feet and checked himself over, finding a large scar and a bald patch on either side of his chest. He took a few breaths and a few steps, before he looked at me and saw the strain and the tears in my eyes. I probably didn’t look great, especially as a large chunk of my health had just disappeared. The immediate anger of me making a decision he had wanted to make himself went out of him, and he walked over and shoved his head into my hand, both his apology and a welcoming back of our bond.

“I'm sorry; you didn't deserve that. I was careless. Thank you for saving me.” He said, his voice sounding contrite, but he didn't need to apologise. This dungeon was changing all of us, and not all in good ways.

Mia arrived with us just then, and dropped to her knees to check Boone out and reassure herself that the fox was okay. Before he could even react she had gathered him into a hug and squeezed him against her. “I'm glad you're safe, Boone. You scared the life out of ‘Cadia, and I've had to do all the fighting while you got better.” Boone looked at me and Mia guiltily, but accepted the hug with a minimum of discomfort, before he snorted and pulled away.

Mia had to take a breath and heave herself to her feet. She even winced as she straightened and held her side. Concerned, I made a move to her side and found a long, shallow gash that had pierced her armour just enough to draw blood. “Mia, you're hurt. Here, the bottle has one charge left. You take it, then I'll refill it. Boone is up now so I want you to try and rest for the next few platforms. If you exhaust yourself before we get to the boss we’ll all be in trouble.” she snorted, but accepted the healing, and then I recharged the enchantment, feeling the unsettling feeling of emptying my Essence down to half capacity as I also refilled my Foxfire Receptacle. Truthfully, I don't know if the healing bottle was even useful to Mia as she stood now - her Body Attribute of Wood 5 gave her five hundred health as a base, and wounds that looked like they actually hurt her would have more than likely killed or crippled me or Boone. Thirty Health over ten minutes wasn't really more than a bandage to her at this point, but without a healing skill of her own, it was all we had.

Of course, with our luck being what it was, with me hurt, with my armour off and my health down at 120/200 as I'd given the last charge of the healing bottle to Mia, that we were ambushed by archers - and the first thing they targeted was the fragile glass bottle in my hands.

I stared at my bloody hand and the fragments of broken glass and electrum that were suddenly all that was left of my one and only healing item beyond, just, stuffing my face for hours at a time. The shock of seeing something I had been exceptionally proud to create turn into broken glass in the blink of an eye froze me to the spot. I just stood there blinking.

“Arcadia!” Mia barrelled into me and tackled me behind the nearest cover, Boone limping behind, as arrows flooded the space I had been standing not a moment before. I rolled to a stop with Mia covering me with her own body. Her armour looked like it had taken some new scrapes, but she appeared unharmed. She grabbed my hand and started pulling out glass from the cuts. I came back to myself with a rush of blood and anger right to my heart.

“Shit! That was all the quick healing we had! It was all the healing you had period!” I swore and started furiously swiping at my hand, brushing out the fragments of glass before the healing potion that had spilled there could heal the skin over the glass. It was phenomenally painful, and I bit my cheek and tried not to start crying over the feeling.

Mia looked at me, looked at the broken glass, and sighed. “Then you’ll make another one - a better one. That's what you're good at. Don't worry about needing to heal me. I'll just have to not get hurt. That's what I'm good at.”

I looked back at her with frustration and a tiny bit of anger. “No, you won't. You'll get unlucky and die in the blink of an eye if you're overconfident. Dad taught you better. How much Essence do you have, really? You’ve been spending it pretty freely for the last hour, it can't be much.”

“About 20%. Maybe a little less. My receptacles still have a little bit from the last refill.” She said it guiltily, and looked away from me as she basically told me she was close to kneeling over. Running out of essence was the best way to fall unconscious. We had both passed out for various reasons in this dungeon, and luckily - very luckily - been saved by its masters. I was not going to let Mia do it to herself on purpose.

“No, we have to run. We’re only a few platforms away from the door. We make a break for it and just run through whatever comes at us. Boone, how’s your essence, Buddy?”

The fox was still not doing well. Their health was technically full, and he was awake and functional, but I noticed a tremor in his legs that hadn't been there before and he was breathing heavily. No matter how good magical healing was, or how miraculous a regeneration Ability, having multiple organs turned to mush would leave more than a few marks. The scars on his sides just proved that. “My essence is pretty full, but I don't think I will be able to run any real distance. I have maybe one good sprint in me, but not much past that.…thank you for saving me, Arcadia. I'm sorry I snapped at you. You didn't deserve it and I feel like a fool.”

“Boone, buddy, I would never let you die like that if I could save you. You're my brother, my best friend. You're half my soul. I'm sorry for the way it happened, but you don't have to be sorry for panicking when you woke up.” I rubbed his sides, even over the uneven scar, and kissed him on the forehead. He whined at the attention, as he usually did, but he pressed into me and wagged his tail all the same. “Besides, I don't need you to run, I just need you to shield us as best you can. Mia, you carry Boone, and set the pace. We don't fight if we can help it.”

“Okay, but how do we get to the next platform from here? Boones’ shields only really stop ten or so arrows and there are a lot more than that in each volley.” Mia didn't look happy, but I knew she would see the sense in saving what little we had. We still had a boss to face after all. As for the archers, I looked around and finally located a large broken brick. I hefted it, and with a struggle and a thought as I had to think of it as a weapon in my mind, I charged it with a Wood 2 Foxfire Imbuement charge. “How do you feel about throwing a bomb, Boone?” The fox looked at me, looked at the stone, and grinned a vulpine grin, before we got ready to run.