Thirteen opponents, a giant ball of stone that was essentially a rolling weapons platform, and three hidden allies all in room about the size of a small cafeteria. Motion rippled as weapons rose and magical energies blended.

Yuki engaged the Blink emulator to teleport us out to the lobby—where a stone javelin waited to meet us. My Dog’s Agility wasn’t as snappy as it used to be, because of the loss of lightning affinity, yet it was fast enough to let me to twist out of the way. The point drew blood but didn’t do any real damage.

Slivers of stone attacked every place I went afterward, though. No matter the direction or speed, the hierophant seemed to know where I would be. Yuki teleported us twice more, to no avail. If not for the Unbroken Shield I’d cast, I would’ve already been riddled by his attacks.

The ground was wet under my opponents from the water dripping from their clothes, so Yuki threw a Cold Snap at it to slow them down. The hidden mind bought me time to heal the likely massive internal injuries resulting from three consecutive Blinks, except I felt no pain from them. The authority of my body refused to be disrupted by anything so trivial. The teleports had also landed us where Yuki intended us to go. They’d been able to similarly influence the emulator.

I lost a beat registering that. The room echoed bang-bang-bang as arrows shot at me, and they smashed-smashed-smashed against the wall as Yuki teleported us one more time.

The Deer God prodded me to wake up and in response I pivoted to avoid a flying sword attempting to cut off my hand. A slip to the side avoided a second sword aiming for my ankle. A third came from behind, but Yuki risked teleporting us back into the middle of the crowd.

I was ready. Immediately, two spears came at me from the front and back, but I was faster than both, slipping forward to move inside the reach of an older scout. There was no reason to hold back. All my strikes were Unerring. The qi alternated between Spiral Pierce and Cat’s Claw.

The scout’s primary talent was her Wood Sense. Her last thought was of not wanting to die somewhere so cold. The Deer God flashed a warning, and I spun to let a spear slip past. Then, I stepped into a second scout’s reach. My knife cut across his forearms before slashing his throat.

Stone bullets cracked against my Unbroken Shield, but Yuki softened the blows with an Air Shield, the two defenses working together. The flying swords—there were four; the one I’d not seen earlier hovered in front of the Hierophant to protect him—wove between the scouts and soldiers to attack me. My other opponents moved to hem me in, but Yuki popped us out and away.

I reappeared beside a soldier known for his love of hard liquor, pulling at the ice under his feet to unbalance him. My knife went through his eye to pierce his brain. I felt the intensity of a person’s focus behind me. Another soldier rushed forward with—and suddenly my thoughts jumbled as she shot a magical light from her hand.

Yuki took full control of the emulator to Blink us twice, picking the destinations at random to see if that would avoid the hierophant’s predictions, yet each time there were daggers of stone waiting for us. He went for my eyes, my throat, my joints, and my spine. He instead caught me in the meaty parts of my body—the bicep, the quadricep, and the abdomen. The stone dug to borrow deeper, but Yuki doubled the Iron Body, which held the slivers at bay.

Ikfei nearly acted to disrupt Xefwen’s control, but both Yuki’s and my thoughts flared in opposition. She was our hidden knife, quite literally. We’d left the silvered, obsidian weapon in a shadow tucked against the wall behind the counter, and no one had noticed it.

My thoughts de-jumbled, and I recast my Unbroken Shield. A beat later, I threw an Unerring dagger at the hierophant, but his stone cube shot it out of the air like it was nothing. He didn’t smirk or anything like that, though. Instead, he observed me with furrowed brows.

Yuki flashed us behind him, and my knife stabbed, but—ding-ding-ding—all it met were small shields of stone that blocked every attack. We teleported away before my shield broke from his immediate reprisal. So much stone had come at me, it was like getting hit by a shotgun.

I recast the spell, just in case, and the shield shrugged off the next handful of attacks, giving me a beat to regain my bearings.

I pulled the water from a soldier’s clothes to splash it into his eyes, though he reacted well, attempting to put distance between us. I followed with a feint that transitioned into an attack on his nearby ally, dropping into a roll that stabbed her in the foot, and then rising to catch her across the neck as she bent over in pain.

I grabbed her by the shoulders before she fell, and her body took a flurry of hits from the massed soldiers in front of me. These people were more skilled in fighting than I was, but magic ensured my weapons were sharper, my body faster and stronger, and my aim unerring.

Yuki said, ‘All the scouts are dead.’

I’m quickest? I asked.

They confirmed it. Our Dog’s Agility spells had improved upon becoming silvered. There wasn’t anyone faster than me—especially now that all the scouts had been removed from the playing field.

My breathing was heavy, but I wasn’t tired. My eyes missed nothing as my opponents shifted their approaches. Only fifteen yards away, the hierophant frowned, then stepped out from behind the counter, as if to properly face me.

The fool, all these people would die because of him. What a waste.

The soldiers knew better than to bunch up. They spread out, and—in possibly the strangest moment since the fight began—I felt the Deer God’s appreciation for their good tactics. It wouldn’t help them, but least they were doing their best. That was the sentiment.

He nudged my attention. A handful of the soldiers, while they’d put some distance between themselves, they’d also unintentionally lined up. It would’ve been a perfect set up for a Lightning Strike. Instead, Yuki teleported us over, so that the Deer God could charge out of the herd, his hooves pounding the stone floor and his antlers tilted like a cow catcher to pierce the soldiers and toss them aside.

Four people dead, just like that. The pack who’d thought themselves predators suddenly realized they were the prey. The expeditions reacted by dispersing even more. They shot their spells and trained their weapons on the Deer God, but he’d already disappeared back into the herd.

“Another spirit?” Xefwen muttered. “Where did he come from?”

The soldiers held their weapons at the ready. The flying swords formed a semicircle before me.

“Would you like to surrender now?” I offered.

The hierophant frowned, his eyes turning the reddish gold of the setting sun. “I see him now, a faint tremor in your wake. No wonder you felt so confident, but eventually you will tire. Eventually, the magical energies you spend so freely will be exhauste—urk!”

The obsidian knife, quiet all this time, had risen from the ground behind the hierophant to stab him in the back. A shield had moved to block the attack, but the spell-infused weapon had pierced through the stone.

Xefwen arched in pain, and I was suddenly front of him. Alas, the shields didn’t budge against my knife. He also contested Ikfei’s control of the obsidian, which left the weapon hanging useless in the air.

Then the cube shot at me, forcing a retreat before my spell shield broke. Taking advantage of the reprieve, the hierophant surrounded himself with stone from the sphere. The armor shimmered with mana too.

A beat later, the rest of the sphere burst, and a thousand stone splinters filled the room. The control was masterful—no matter where I went, an attack waited for me, all without touching a single one of his allies. I would’ve been shredded if not for Ikfei contesting the hierophant’s control.

“How?” the hierophant yelled.

But screw that guy, I didn’t have to tell him anything. Still, he’d been element-touched for a long time, and my Ikfei had almost entirely ignored the stone portion of her One with Stone and Water talent until only eight years ago. It was already a miracle she could blunt the points so that I was being beaten instead of pierced.

The soldiers didn’t dare move for fear of being torn apart.

Yuki and I shot a doubled-Spark at the hierophant, but his shield absorbed the spell and sent it into the ground before it touched him. If I’d been a Storm Caller still, I might’ve pushed past, but well… I wasn’t, so I couldn’t.

What I was, was a Saint of Water. What I could do with my path at the moment… was not much. I’d barely taken my first steps along it. But I had been training to use every weapon at my disposal, and this wasn’t a game where I’d hoard ten thousand potions until the very end. Tools were meant to be used.

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Yuki knew my intent, so they blinked us above the hierophant, the long talon emerging from the pocket like a lance. Somehow, he’d still seen the attack coming and dodged aside so that I only caught him in the shoulder. The talon embedded in the floor, pinning Xefwen in the process.

A host of his slivers smashed into me. Yuki teleported us away, since they were now as sharp as pins—we’d left Ikfei behind along with the talon. She’d flowed down its length, hidden in the water she’d released from the pocket.

Finally injured, the hierophant redoubled the layers of stone surrounding him. Yet he’d left a grid of tiny holes to let air in. Water seeped through these pinpricks and dripped onto his hair, mingling with the remnants of the rain already there. Down Ikfei flowed into his soaked shirt. It must’ve felt like sweat to the hierophant—normal, expected.

His breathing had grown labored due to the wound I’d left in him. He cursed under his breath.

Xefwen’s control grew sloppy. His people cried out as the stone slivers buzzed through the room, turning it into a blender. My shield broke, was recast, and then broke again. Yuki and I alternated—back and forth, back and forth—burning close to forty mana each in the process.

Meanwhile, I’d walked—step by steady step—toward where Xefwen stood. Through the pools of blood, over the splintered bones, and past the pulpy flesh of his allies whose light called to me as I went. The only survivor was the One with the Sword; he’d laid his blades prone on the ground to protect them the hierophant’s onslaught.

When I finally reached Xefwen, I carefully took the obsidian knife that had been left hanging in the air. Then I put it in the Hoarder’s Pocket, whereupon Ikfael withdrew it from her position within his armor.

He screamed when the knife stabbed him between the ribs. Just as quickly, he clamped down to refuse Ikfei’s control of it, but the damage was done. Between the wound in his shoulder and the one in his chest, Yuki now had multiple points of ingress. Their qi moved out of Ikfei and into the hierophant.

The hidden mind split their attention—a simultaneous attack on Xefwen’s shoulder to sever the already injured meridians and his heart dantian to disable the man’s ability to use qi. Silvered against silvered, it came down to a contest of skill, and there wasn’t anyone on Diaksha more skilled in qi than our Yuki.

The blender spun even faster as Xefwen panicked, so I ducked down between him and the counter for extra protection. Even so, with Yuki occupied, it was only me casting Unbroken Shield, and I could no longer keep up with the damage inflicted. Enough slivers stuck out of me that I looked like a porcupine.

Still, Yuki knew how to work, and the shining light surrounding the stone flickered out. The spell must’ve been an advanced one, using at least both mana and qi. And without that one key component—hah, I can’t be in that poor a shape if I haven’t lost my ability to pun—the magical stone turned to regular stone, which was still deadly, but my shield withstood it better. I gathered no new slivers.

Xefwen’s breathing turned into gasps and his eyes panicked as he realized his predicament. It was child’s play for Yuki to see through his thoughts: this Eight was using abilities that should’ve been impossible for him. Not even the presence of the deer-avatar spirit of the land should’ve made it possible.

The pyramid must’ve been the cause. The anti-divination magics, although they’d faltered, had to have affected his ability to read the outcomes stemming from this moment. Escape, Xefwen must escape in order to regroup and reestablish his dominance.

The opportunity of Old Baxteiyel was lost for now, but only temporarily. Nothing, nothing would deter Xefwen from what he set his sights upon.

From inside his body, Yuki enjoyed the front-row seat to the hierophant’s delusions. They delighted in Xefwen’s surprise as a Cat’s Claw knife was drawn across his neck, severing the arteries feeding his brain. Magics flared out as he attempted to reinforce his body. Stone clamped onto the wound to keep him from bleeding out, but his control was contested, and the rocky bandage fell to the side, clattering against the armor.

Behind him, a pool of water clung to his cloak; a pseudopod stretched out with a magic dagger of simple steel held at the end. Ikfei stabbed him again and again until the silvered diviner could hold no longer. The stone around him finally lost its life.

Yuki ate well of the qi in the hierophant’s body. They’d memorized the patterns in his meridians too, but so much of the man’s magics had clearly been tied to his path and his talents. The spell to energize the stone, though, had offered some tantalizing insights. I felt them humming in thought as they traveled back into Ikfei, who in turn flowed as water back into her figurine. She was just as aware as I that there were survivors yet.

I stood with a mince, already casting an Anesthetic to help with the pain. Suddenly, the stone slivers shuddered and withdrew from my body. Blood leaked as if from a sieve, but water washed over me to heal the wounds. I counted three different casts to deal with all the punctures, microfractures, and bruising too.

Groaning, I stretched and looked at the devastation left by the hierophant’s storm of stone. A handful of bitter ghosts remained, but all it took was a prayer and a fraction of my will to send them onward.

Interestingly, the water on the ground rose like mist in the process, seemingly cleansing the area of the lingering spirits. I felt my eyebrows climb, as well as Ikfei’s and Yuki’s interest in the phenomena. Apparently there was more to being a Saint of Water than what appeared on my Status.

I walked to where a group of four swords lay on the floor and nudged one with my foot. “Do you surrender?”

He who was One with the Sword emerged from one of the blades and then proceeded to immediately kneel. “Honored, I do. Please do not let the… the former hierophant’s foolishness keep you from mercy.”

His spirit was a mess. The people he’d lost today were friends and allies. Their expedition had been intended to win them glory that others in Sugrusu Hakei’s past had lost. He felt a bitter, bitter regret for agreeing to come to this hellish place.

Was there a desire for revenge against me? Of course there was. He’d also seen what I, seemingly alone except for the one-time aid of the Deer God, had done. This man was respected and feared for his incredible talent to control swords, and yet he saw me so far out of his league I was an impossible-to-climb mountain.

How do you take revenge against a mountain? You don’t. You do your best to live your life outside of its shadow, and that was exactly what this man intended.

“Let me take what’s left of my people and go,” he said, bending his forehead to the bloody ground.

In the corridor leading to the worship hall, two wide-eyed scouts crouched. There were also likely people left guarding the pyramid’s entrance.

“You may go,” I said.

At the same time, Ikfei opened a path through the wall the hierophant had created. My team stood with their weapons at the ready on the other side. Yuki had let them know that we’d been victorious, but their fierce eyes sent a message: Although I might seem alone, I was not.

Their spirits boiled with fury at not having been able to help while I was under attack. As the Sugursans walked past them, my team memorized the faces of my opponents, especially of the one named Skara, the Maltran spy among them. Snow couldn’t control the growl directed her way.

Mumu approached to put her hand on my shoulder; her scowl deepened as she saw past me to the gruesome remains of the fight’s aftermath. Her grip tightened… yet I barely felt it.

The adrenaline wasn’t yet out of my system, and I’d instinctively kept Iron Heart active. My hands ought to be trembling, but somehow my authority overruled the body’s demands. Silvered… becoming silvered was such a trip.

“Are you well?” she asked.

Yes, no? How was I supposed to answer the question in the wake of such bloodshed? I’d killed people before, but not in such numbers. I’d had to defend myself—I wasn’t a fool to think otherwise—but I couldn’t also avoid thinking about the families these people had left behind.

A waste, I’d thought before, and I thought it again, A god-damned waste.

Still, I nodded to Mumu to let her know I’d manage.

“The hierophant of Albei is dead and a dozen dawn with him. Our Eight…” Mumu turned away from the massacre to examine me more closely. “Has ruined yet another set of armor, and your spear’s missing too.” She hesitated before continuing, “You don’t otherwise seem different.”

Ah, I was still buried in the land, deep in the stones to avoid the blood atop them. When I let it go, the team flinched as one, like they’d suddenly spotted a giant wave about to crash down on them.

“Gods damn, that’s heavy,” Haol blurted, then he stared in awe and horror and glee. “It’s like you’re looking right through me—what a deeply unsettling feeling.”

The expressions on the others’ faces weren’t that different, and even Snow yowled in distress.

So, to their immense relief, I ducked back into the land, at least partially. However, they all remained shellshocked in the aftermath, unsure of what to say or do.

I was now the same level as Ithia and Silasenei. I could technically contest with either of them for their leadership positions in the city. Hells, I could even become the new hierophant if I wanted to. Except the idea of any of those things made me viscerally ill.

And my team knew it, but they had to get accustomed to… well, my new authority and the fact that I could wipe out a dozen dawn warriors in the space of a couple of minutes.

It was Snow and Teila, bless them both, who approached me first. Snow butted her head into one hand, while Teila took the other in her own. Her eyes teared up as she said, “My father-in-law is the best.”

I saw the realization spreading across the rest of the team, and tears tracked down their faces too. At Level 14, I wouldn’t be able to spend much time in Voorhei anymore. Even me staying in the Glen would likely be too close for the village’s safety.

Teila closed to hug me. She held me like I was as fragile as glass and whispered, “What happens now? Bee and Ali will…”

“I don’t know,” I said, my voice rough. “This was always going to happen, but the timing…”

Teila looked into my face. “And Ikfael? You can’t leave her.”

You didn’t tell them? I asked Yuki.

‘The news is for the two of you to share,’ they answered.

“Don’t worry,” I said aloud. “Ikfael and I are in a good place. We’ll be fine, although we’re going to keep her presence a secret a while longer yet.”

Ikfei sent her agreement. The people from both Sugrusu Hakei and Maltra now believed she was dead, and there was no reason to enlighten them otherwise.

Mumu nodded. Pride and sadness wove around her spirit in equal measure, yet her voice was steady when she said, “There are decisions to be made for both short and long term. But first—I see light among the fallen. Haol and Teila will collect it, and their weapons and armor too. We will need to consult our client about how to proceed. Whether to stay here or…” She left the rest hanging.

Tegen sent, ‘The Maltrans have a way to shed the effects of Prey of the Hunter. Do we follow the spy?’

‘If we don’t, we may lose her trail,’ Mumu replied.

‘She won’t go far,’ Haol sent, ‘not while the storm hangs over us. We have time to consider the situation.’

What do we know of the storm? I asked.

Tegen answered, ‘The Temple of Wanting is dry thanks to the sealed doors, but the city’s streets are completely impassable.’

Then we do have time, I thought. At least until the storm wanes and the flooding diminishes. I started to poke my phone to check the weather report, but the forecast was no longer there. The feature had disappeared at the same time as my old path.

The others had looked at me expectantly, so I shook my head.

“That’s all right,” Haol said. “We’ll know when we know.”

Teila made way for him to embrace me, and he clapped me on the back. “Well done, our Eight. Well done!”

Then it was Mumu’s turn, and she held on for a time. “We see you. You’ve grown so much, and we see you.”