Ornal head towards the door and simply vanished into the shadow after wreathing himself in dark mana. The three of us walked over to the door with weapons ready and peeked out the windows to see what was going on outside. Outside there was dozens of light arrows flying at the building and slamming into it, only for some dark mana seep out of the walls and block the explosions. There was over a dozen priests, maybe around 20, firing light spells like crazy at the building as well as other moon elves that were wearing the same black leather armour with carvings. They flitted in and out of existence it seemed as they went about, causing havoc with the priests. Three perished before the rest realized what was going on.

One of them realized what was going on and yelled "Moon elves! They hired moon elves to help them! Cast light spells to get rid of shadows and cancel dark mana!" The other priests that heard quickly cast some light ball and scattered them around the road and alleys haphazardly, lighting up the place. The moon elves were not as affected as you would think they were and kept flitting about in and out of existence pretty much as they did their work. The priests were getting cornered slowly but surely. I even saw Ornal occasionally as he would decapitate a priest out of nowhere and vanish, or sometimes fire tentacles of dark mana out of any shadows still unilluminated.

That was when I heard the same deep voice yell "Enough!". Quickly the moon elves backed away but not fast enough as a large sphere of golden light flashed into existence and shot beams of light out and seared holes through the arms and legs of the moon elves. None of the beams hit anyone other than a moon elf, as the beams seemingly hit the airbrakes and petered out of existence when they would otherwise hit them.

The moon elves retreated a fair distance and I saw that 3 out of the 12 I saw were downed and being dragged away by their comrades. The building we were hiding in was also hit several times and the beams seared halfway through the walls, even with the dark mana resisting the spell. I saw Ornal wave his hand at someone who nodded and promptly vanished using dark mana. He reappeared in the building and called out to no one in particular. "Have you finished the spell yet? Lord Ornal needs it soon, we can't delay for much longer." To my surprise someone in the darkness of the second floor replied, saying "Yes, yes I know but you have to understand this sort of spell isn't easily cast nowadays. It isn't like the olden days. The escape spell will be ready within 30 seconds, tell that to the lord."

The voice that spoke sounded old and tired. I didn't know who it was but they were prepping our escape so I was just praying for the old dude to hurry up, and it seemed Ray was thinking the same as he spoke with impatience and worry evident in his voice. "Please hurry up, I need to get away from the church. Pick up the pace!" He was gripping his spear tightly and Ronia looked like she was going to say something, likely to reassure him but there was that feeling again, the feeling of chains wrapping around my neck and appendages. The others seemed to feel it as well and this time there was light glowing from everyone here. The feeling started to get tighter and then I heard a loud howl of something followed by a massive scraping and gouging sound. The glow faded and with it the feeling. I started to gasp for breath as my throat was released from the choking feeling. As I was sucking in air I turned back to the window and saw what happened outside, and my mouth fell agape.

The retributionist was clutching one bleeding shoulder where his arm was just gone. The road and nearby building looked like some massive creature had bit a large chunk out of them and I saw Ornal gasping for breath and holding a bleeding stomach. His left arm also had an arrow of light buried into it that didn't explode. He looked like he was on his last legs but so did the retributionist. At least until the priests started to heal the retributionist. They started casting healing spells onto the man repeatedly and he started to visibly look better, with the bleeding stopping and his stump of an arm already healing back into existence.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

I heard Ornal yell out towards the other Moon elves, "Head back to the base! We're done here! Mission accomplished!" With that he vanished from existence and flitted from shadow to shadow as he head back towards us. I saw that 2 other moon elves were injured and bleeding but they had drunk a potion and were healing. I then heard the old man from behind me say "Gather into the magic circle and we will be leaving! Don't stay outside the circle or anything on the outside will be left behind! Attached to you or not!"

I quickly got into the expanding magic circle and made sure every single part of my body was within it. I didn't want to lose a finger or toe to a magic circle and have it left behind. The other moon elves gathered in as well as a robed old moon elf. His armour had far more intricate patterns on it than the rest and he emanated power, I didn't want to mess with him that was for sure. He seemed like he would give even a level 120 some trouble, possibly higher. Ornal burst in with the remaining moon elves and when they were gathered within the circle the elder said some words in a language I didn't understand. It sounded similar to the elven language I had memorized from the game but still different. This confused me as i knew quite a lot about the game and its lore but I didn't get to comprehend this for long as I felt a tremendous amount of mana pour out of the circle.

It made the ground vibrate and hum as the spell build power. I then felt like I was being yanked from here and violently torn from here and was being hurled somewhere fast. Before I left though I heard the retributionist scream out "Mark of Light!!" He then snarled out "You won't escape justice for long, necromancer!"

The feeling of being hurled around ended almost instantly but it felt like it went on for minutes. I dropped to my knees as the spell ended and we were somewhere in the wilderness. I tried to get up but my legs gave out and I flopped onto the ground without energy. It seemed it wasn't just me as Ronia, Ray and Herald also collapsed. Most of the moon elves also fell to their knees or onto their butts as they waited out the effects of the spell. I saw that Ornal was still standing but he looked rather tired and the elder that had made the spell was still standing, looking perfectly fine.

There was just a moment of silence as everyone gathered their thoughts and tended to the wounded. The people that were injured were healed by Ronia or drank potions. No one was killed but healing holes that were seared through your legs and arms took a lot out of someone it seemed. Ray finally said something and just flopped onto his back, laughing and just said "i'm alive....and not captured by the church. Today's a great day." That made several other people laugh, including me. We all laughed and the stress from the fight earlier seemed to vanish as the mood started to turn far more bright. People started to chat about various things and some even pulled out cooking utensils from their bags and started to cook up meals. The smell of food caught the attention of others and it soon turned into an impromptu dinner feast.

I wanted to join in but my mind screamed at me to check the surrounding first, so I begrudgingly used my mana sense to detect nearby. I only felt several smaller presences that were steering clear of our gathering, with one massive signature coming from the elder moon elf. Ornal seemed to have a decently sized signature as well. With my short check for enemies finished I went to join the feast but was stopped by the elder who called out to me with a curious tone. "So you also know how to use mana sense hmm? Interesting. Most people don't even know about this skill until far later and train to use it properly, but you look so young."

I was thinking about what to say when I heard Ronia speak up after swallowing a mouthful of food. Without much care about what she was saying she replied to the elder and said "Oh thats cause Zane is older than he looks! He's actually been around since the massacre of Twiity forest Y'know? Speaking of, you still haven't answered what you know about it." She looked at me and I felt the sudden sharp gaze of both the elder, Ornal as well as several other moon elves. Sweat started to pour down my neck as I inwardly cursed Ronia for putting me into this troubling situation. How the hell was I going to tell these people 'Oh yeah, I was there during the game event and sorta looted the former elven capital while killing hundreds of pillaging mercenaries?'