Shadow/Holly

After my waking rend attack. Nega Luca had turned into a puddle of steaming black goo. She was still alive sputtering around the street while firing Shadowbolts back at me.

I gave chase using my knife to deflect and cut a path through the bolts. “Get back here! Pin!” I yelled throwing a knife at the blob. The white needle stabbed into the goo, but instead of getting pinned, Gooca moved around it.

Her body made of liquid was impossible to capture. My best hopes was to disintegrate her with fire. I was about to reach into my inventory for a napalm granade, when something black flew past my head. I had to duck under it to avoid the bolt. Looking up to the attacker I saw an undead archer sitting on the roof.

It wasn’t just any undead archer. This was the same archer that was apart of 10th squad. She’d brought him back to life. In my shock I hadn’t noticed the incoming iron fist.

It hit me in the face causing me to fall back into something sharp. The monk had suddenly appeared and knocked me into the assassin’s waiting blade. That sneaky asshole had been in stealth waiting right behind me.

Burning pain radiated from my back as blood pooled in my mouth. I think he knock out one of my teeth. Manifesting a throwing knife, I activated the ability, “Arial blade!” with a flick of my wrist the knife glowed a bright blue flying directly into the monks head.

The assassin twisted and ripped the knife out of my back. I cried out in pain nearly falling to my knees. He tried to stab again, but using all the will power I had, I jumped into the air and used the pin skill to nail him to the pavement.

My blood rained down from my wound, as my HP bar dropped rapidly. I stuffed a mid portion into my mouth and drank the damage away while landing on the opposite roof to the archer.

The archer fired a stun shot, as soon as my feet touched down. The arrow burned with black lighting, as it buzzed through the air. I withdrew my knife and tried to deflect the shot, but the black lightning still managed to transfer itself through my knife covering my body in it’s paralyzing energies.

The roof exploded as a monster of shadow, metal, and bone burst through its stone ceiling. It grabbed me by the tail and swung me around like a wrecking ball. My body was slammed into what remained of the building, before being chucked high up into the air.

I was sure it was over, but a strong frequency began to grow. It was one I understood as dark magic. I felt Gooca on a far away roof. The ocean of frequencies showing me her form.

Only her arm had manifested, but it was all she needed to hold Lucas staff. The staff pulsed with dark energy. Not one, but three spells formed at its tip. What happened next made my eyes widen as the spells went off unleashing three necrotic bursts simultaneously.

Move dammit! Move! That was when Alice’s name disappeared from my party list. No, not her too! I'm sick of losing them! What was I supposed to say to Master!?

My body was so stiff, but my mind was still clear. I took control of my menu, using my will power to activate my guild leader privileges. A moment later and a large blue panel popped into existence, blocking the blast. The cost was a lot for a single save, but at least I was still alive.

I felt my body loosen up. The black lightning went away. Allowing me to take back control. With my cat-like sense of balance and reflexes. I managed to flip my body through the air and land on my feet. My tail smacked the roof top I was on cracking one of the stone tiles.

Even before I had landed. I popped a full potion into my mouth healing the damage within a few sips. “Alice, not her.” I cried.

She wasn’t in the guild and the fight log didn’t say anything. Did she really die? Please, please be okay. Why didn’t I add her to the guild? She would still be there even if the party was broken. “No, I can’t do this anymore. Not again.”

I need to focus. I wasn’t dealing with just one enemy anymore. With a thought I cashed the shield in for a fraction of the price.

It was damaged which lowered it more. I felt bad about wasting funds like that, but there was nothing I could do. Once this battle is over, our country would end up poor, with all the repairs we were going to have to do.

If I could take Gooca out, then this would be over, but as it stood I had no idea where she was. It was like she was in stealth. Her goo body didn’t make very many waves and when she hid inside buildings it was basically muted. I should take out her minions first. That’ll force her to come out.

The archer fired a multi-shot at me. I felt the danger before I ever saw it. Trusting my instincts I let my body take over. I managed to weave between the arrows while using my knife to swipe some away. However, I still got hit in my leg with two of them.

As soon as I was hit the monk made an appearance as if waiting for a moment of weakness. He still had my knife in his head. The undead fighter threw a barrage of lightning fast punches.

I avoided them as best I could, then sliced his stomach open with my knife, following it up with a punch to his chest. The monkey kin was sent falling onto the street below, but to my surprise he got back up.

He was undead, yet my throwing knife did nothing when it stabbed him between the eyes. His HP bar had gone down though. I guess head shots only worked on none magical zombies.

I avoided a charge shot from the archer while firing off another Areal blade into his shoulder, disabling his arm and preventing him from drawing his bow again. I had no idea how I knew to do that. Was this really all apart of instinct?

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

With great pain I ripped the arrows out of my leg while chugging down another portion. How could I be struggling with these guys? They were low level NPCs. Granted they were above the 10 level threshold, turning each one into a mini boss, but still.

The issue was in their team work and real world combat abilities. If I had my own support these guys would be dead. I needed to get this over with, so I could help Master. There was a lot of fire in her direction. I hope she was okay.

“Arg!” yelled another zombie as he climbed up and sprinted at me. This one was dressed like a cleric… August.

I tripped him letting him fall on his face. Then jammed my knife into his neck using the Assassinate ability to cut his head off. Without it he couldn’t move his body.

His HP had also suddenly dropped to only a few dozen points. “Sorry August. I wish I could have helped you guys.” I then jammed my knife into his grunting skull, finishing off his remaining HP.

Now there was only the death soldier, the assassin, the monk and archer to deal with. I wasn’t sure where the big guy was, so I went for the closest enemy. Which just so happened to be the assassin sneaking up on me again. Producing a grenade, I pulled the pin allowing the trigger to pop open.

Reaching out, I slammed it down the assassin’s throat who up to that point had been in stealth mode. He stumbled back while I jumped down to deal with the monk. As I landed I heard the loud bang from the fragment grenade going off inside his skull, followed by the sound of a wet splatter.

The monk was having trouble coming after me, as its feet were tangled up in its guts. While dancing around his struggles, I used both my knives and began chipping away at its HP. Bit by bit, my blades dismantled the monks body as if I were a butcher.

First he lost a few fingers, his hand, his arms. I took his legs and finally while he was on what remained of his knees, I took his head. His body fell to the ground and that was that.

The archer fell off the roof. Using his good arm he tried stabbing me with an arrow. I avoided him before activating a Waking Rend. The violet molts swallowed large sections of its body. Leaving it a 1/3 of what it once was.

Finally the death soldier made an appearance by breaking through a building and coming out to the street. I was so done with all of this. When this was over I was gonna cuddle Master until we fall asleep together.

Something I noticed was that the undead soldier was a boss monster. Rank 1 to be exact. I didn't think bosses could be summoned like that. There had to be some hacking involved.

The armored giant swung his rusty metal blade at me. I avoided it and charged in for a slash. My knife cut into it’s armor like it was butter, but didn’t do much damage.

Waking Rend had been wasted. I’d need to wait for the cool down to wear off. I could use my ultimate skill, but that had such a long cool down that it wasn't worth wasting on this guy.

That, or I could probably hack away at it until he was dust. That was basically what I did. Each swing of my knives created sparks of hot metal.

Even thought my knife was sharp enough to go right through, it was still just a tooth pick compared to his body. I should have gone with a dagger, or something a little longer that still qualified as a knife.

I let my instincts take over as the vibrations from my heart sent wave after wave of frequencies through space. Telling me exactly where this guy was. Where he was coming from and what he was doing. I weaved and sliced cutting away at its armor. At its HP bar.

right when I was about to take the last sliver of health, a Shadowbolt flew past my head. For a second I thought this guy could cast magic, but it wasn’t that. Gooca had crawled onto the undeads shoulder—like an evil goopy parrot.

Part of the goo shaped itself back into her head. “you’re too strong. Even for someone of your level. Lets see how you do against a rank 2 boss.”

Her body melted into the undead soldier. A giant violet magic circle appeared under the undead summon. I was about to attack when I felt chains wrap around my left leg.

Instead I waited for her attack. I’ll activate After Image and hit it with an Areal Blade. Except the attack didn’t come. Magic circle after magic circle began piling on top of one another.

The power was palpable. It crashed into me like a tidal wave. The only thing holding me in place were the chains wrapped around my leg. My poor ears and tail were flapping in the wind.

More magic circles appeared under my feet. I was hit with a Curse Of Weakness lowering my strength. Followed by a Curse Of Slowness decimating my movement speed.

Right when I thought it couldn't get any worse a blinding curse was thrown on top, followed by a Curse Of Silence preventing me from using most of my hot bar. The onslaught of de-buffs only ended when I was given a Deadman's Curse.

My vision turned dark. It wasn’t like it was all that great to begin with, but now it was way worse. I focused on my new sense instead. The frequencies of the world. With more focus I was able to give color to it. In some ways, it was better than sight.

She buffed her summon with dark infusion and a few other spells I didn’t know. Were there always that many? The mob grew in size as Gooca spread herself throughout its body wrapping herself like bands of shadow to reinforcing the soldier.

It didn’t end there as another giant magic circle appeared. This one was nothing like the spells in the magic skill tree. It looked as though it belonged to a Lich boss.

A moment passed before I saw the bodies of the former 10th squad fly through the air and get torn apart. Their flesh and bones were added to the growing mass of the undead creature.

The undead flesh became apart of it bulking up its skeletal body. The giant roared throwing its sword aside. A spell circle appeared in front of him, manifesting an enormous Shadow Lance.

The undead took hold of it as if holding a sword. The shadows began to bulk and stretch forming a wide thin blade. This thing had become a rank 2 boss. How was this even possible? I could at the very least see his health and name. It read, ‘Undead Amalgamation’.

It's level was N/A, but I could see that it was a rank two. High level rank ones could be taken out by a single max level player. High level rank 2s took a party of at least 4 max level players. In other words. I might be cooked.

The Amalgamation charged forward swinging one of its swords down at me. I dove to the right, tucking in my left leg. The blade sliced through my right freeing me from the chains.

I hopped up off the ground with my good leg. Even with only one, I managed to go up about 50 feet. With the right angle I threw a knife aiming it under what remained of his armor, but it did very little to its HP bar.

That's when I felt a powerful pull dragging me down to a freshly made magic circle. As I fell Shadowbolts were rapidly fired at my body. I rolled into a ball hoping I could protect my vitals.

It almost worked, but then I hit the ground on my back and was unable to move because of the gravity well. My body felt like it would be crushed under all this pressure. I couldn't do a thing.

Gooca’s face appeared once more on the undeads shoulder. Her staff coming out of nowhere, as her arm rose up and out of the goo. “It’s time to say goodbye little kitty.” She pointed her staff at me.

All I could think about were my boys and Master. My boys would be fine. They had their dad after all, but Master. She would be very sad once she saw what happened to me.

I wish I could hug her when she finds out. I wish I could make her feel okay. Make her feel better, but this was it. I couldn’t get away. I really wanted to make Master happy, but I kept doing things that made her uncomfortable.

Why did I have to be so controlling. I wish I could apologize to my ex-husband and my kids for all the crap I pulled. To Master for making her cry. To Luca for getting her killed. Alice was gone now too.

As I stared into the black bubbling necrotic burst, I felt tears falling down the sides of my face. I wish I could have cheered Holly up and given her the childhood she deserved. One with a mother that was loving.

The spell went off.