The demonlings were not long in coming. The base variety came first, in the dozens. They attacked on sight, shrieking loudly to alert their brethren. The pair didn’t have much in the way of weaponry. Oresus’ makeshift quarterstaff allowed him to keep the demonlings at bay with battering blows, but he had a hard time finishing any of them. The short-sword Emokha had taken off of one of the prison guards was better suited for slaying, but provided little in the way of defense.

Given these limitations the pair performed admirably, each having selected a weapon that somewhat suited their fighting style. Emokha charged forward, completely ignoring defense to hack and stab viciously at the smaller creatures. Her exoskeleton was badly damaged but it still provided her with some protection from their attacks, and those that landed anyway she simply ignored in her fury.

They were fewer than might have been expected though. Her onslaught was sufficient to end some blows before they could even begin, and Oresus was behind her, guarding her rear and doing his best to ward off attacks on her flanks. He almost never even tried to kill a foe, instead using his attacks to trip them or knock them off-balance. The rest of the time he blocked, trying to guide enemies into each-other and tangle them up.

The demonlings got their licks in, but against the base type the outcome was inevitable. A shriek drew the demonlings back, where they were reinforced by vets, ordering their lines. Emokha turned to Oresus. “Good. How long has it been?”

“Three m-minutes m-maybe?”

She sighed. “Unfortunate.” Stretching, she pulled him into an awkward one-armed hug, never taking her eyes off the enemy. “Stay alive. I’m going to have to use my ability.”

“B-but…” she was gone.

Emokha launched herself into the still arraying foes, her speed abruptly multiplied several times. She screamed a series of creative invectives in her native language, leaping into the air above the enemy. The stubs of her severed body parts moved, and for a moment the flickering outline of her missing wings and arms appeared. Her momentum was arrested and she fell into her foes, phantom and real arms flashing furiously, moving as if she were hale once more.

The demonlings were caught almost completely off-guard. Blood flew as she ripped the heart out of their nascent formation, slaughtering half a dozen vets in less than a minute. She seized a blade from one of the fallen and went at the survivors with both hands, still screaming. Every once in a while one or both of her missing arms would flicker briefly into partial existence, just long enough to cast a demonling down into death.

Oresus hovered around the edges of the melee, trying to help, but there was a solid wall of demonlings between him and his friend. Those at the periphery turned to engage him and he was unable to cut through. All he could do was try to pull a few in his direction so that she would have an easier time cutting free.

If the opportunity ever came. “Emokha! B-big ones!” Two pairs of C-Types came rushing towards the fray, running up the trees to drop on her from above. She didn’t seem concerned. “They die!”

As they fell she raised her blades above her head to skewer one. Both hit dead center, but failed to strike true. The C-Type simply parried and rolled off, landing and launching an attack. In response she screamed, dropping the demonling blade to grip her short sword in a two-handed grip and bring it crashing down on the monster’s head. It didn’t quite penetrate all the way, but some of the force must have gotten through because the demonling was stunned. The other C-Types rained blows on her from three sides, but Emokha was heedless, brutally hacking at her fallen foe. Eventually its defenses failed and she smashed it into a spraying corpse.

“Emokha! G-get out of there! It’s almost t-time!”

She whirled on the remaining C-Types. “No! They die! They die for what they did!” Completely discarding any attempt to try to defend herself she tackled another C-Type and sawed at its neck with the now battered short sword. Her already cracked exoskeleton began to shatter under concentrated blows.

A roar like thunder rolled through the jungle. The demonlings all paused to seek the source. Emokha didn’t care, still screaming as she severed the C-Type’s jugular. Then her screams trickled off. Painfully she twisted until she was looking up, then, hissing like a steam engine, she haltingly got to her feet.

The roar came again. Closer this time. Emokha’s exoskeleton was starting to slide and shift in place, and she could barely stand. The C-Types ignored her as no longer a threat, but the other demonlings were still holding off Oresus. Emokha closed her eyes for a heartbeat, and when she opened them her breathing was stable. Her lost wings flickered one last time and launched her into the air with unbelievable grace. Then her exoskeleton failed, and she fell.

Without landing. Gloe flashed overhead and caught her one-handed. Throwing her awkwardly over his shoulder he alighted next to Oresus. “We have to go!”

Oresus hastily leapt onto Gloe’s back, and they took off running. “I-is she okay?”

“No. But we can’t stop.”

Oresus looked back. The forest was trembling behind them, the leaves on the trees shivering under the thunderous footsteps as if the woods itself were afraid. Demonling shrieks echoed and their enemies rushed to confront the towering shadow that loomed above them, having trampled through their allies.

“There were six grapplers back there, plus a couple demons and who knows what else. Painful as it is, I think we made the right call.”

The shrieks were getting quieter, the roars unabated. “W-what is that thing?”

Gloe turned and grinned. “Angry.”

...

“It’s k-kind of nice.”

“Yeah.” In fact their little temporary base was becoming downright homey. Gloe surveyed it one last time, just like he always did before setting out. He was fairly safe in the peripheral layer, but the same could not be said of Oresus, so the shelter needed to be secure.

They’d started the structure by binding saplings in a rough sphere to branches. They didn’t have much in the way of tools but Gloe could simply snap small saplings off now, so they were able to reserve their blades for cutting plants. After the framework was in place they’d woven in vines and leaves to serve as camouflage.

Then Oresus had surprised him. The ex-guard had insisted on taking over the butchering and cooking duties, as well as general housekeeping matters, but apparently that hadn’t been enough for him. He had somehow found the time and energy to cultivate some sort of creeping thorn-vine to grow over the entire structure. It provided an additional layer of camouflage and deterrent. The scent emitted by its tiny flowers wasn’t unpleasant, but the insects seemed to find it so.

Gloe was fairly certain he was seeing Oresus’ ability at play. Interesting given that the ex-guard had claimed to be a runt, but he wasn’t asking any questions. Oresus might ask some in turn, and he wasn’t certain how much he wanted to reveal. Besides, he had other concerns at the moment.

Emokha was crippled. She was relatively stable but with her exoskeleton as broken as it was she could barely move. Even the little bit of assisted hobbling around she did brought on overwhelming pain. Gloe didn’t know what her ability was either, but evidently she had used it to push herself to her limits and beyond.

Oresus wasn’t in great shape either. He’d taken several nasty injuries in the fight with the demonlings, and his time in prison had been fairly terrible for his health and overall wellbeing in the first place. They’d had to cauterize several of his injuries because Gloe hadn’t found the time to gather the resources for soap. Infection was still a concern though.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

On top of that both were severely under-leveled for the peripheral layer. For that matter, technically so was Gloe. Given his experience it wasn’t really a problem for him though. Comparatively he was an old hand at avoiding the creatures more powerful than him and ruthlessly picking on those who were weaker.

Which brought him to the task at hand. They had enough smoked meat to last a couple weeks, but he was still out hunting, just not for food. Since Emokha couldn’t be safely moved they were forced to semi-permanently make a home here, but that kind of presence would attract attention sooner or later. They needed their whole party to be hale and mobile, but none of them had any sort of ability to heal others.

Which was why Gloe was out in the woods with a giant flat rock. He was phoenix toad hunting. Now that he was stronger he didn’t need to lure the toads to the rock, but instead could stone them on the move.

He had killed quite a few too. So many in fact that he was a bit concerned he was going to do permanent damage to their local population, but there just was no help for it. Hopefully since they had no natural predators they would recover in time.

From what he could tell the phoenix toads were unchallenged for their particular niche in the local ecosystem. Only one thing kept them from overrunning their habitat. They were assholes.

Specifically, loner assholes. Phoenix toads couldn’t fight for dominance since their ability made that pointless. At the same time they seemed to greatly desire solitude and a patch of their own. So instead of tussling they tried to out-annoy each-other to stake out territory.

They would follow their rival, rushing ahead to snatch away food. Tackle and bounce on their victim at random intervals. Knock him into streams and ponds. Wake him up every time he tried to sleep. The rival would reciprocate, and the contest would continue until one decided it was not worth the effort and moved on to more remote climes.

As a result the phoenix toads were fairly spread out. Fortuitously, as befitted a species without natural predators, the toads were also quite lazy, so their territories were comparatively small. Gloe was able to find quite a few within half a day’s travel from the hutch.

And once he found them the rest was simplicity itself. Imbuing the rock made using it to hunt extremely easy, and he had the speed and accuracy to hit dead center every time. The phoenix toads usually never even knew they were in danger.

The real trouble was everything else in the woods. Gloe was more engaged running away from predators than hunting. It was remarkably hard to be stealthy while holding a giant flat rock above your head, but Gloe didn’t dare ditch it. Finding something the right shape and size had taken over a week.

So he spent an inordinate amount of running through the woods with a giant stony umbrella. He was fairly certain he looked ridiculous but that had never stopped him before. In fact he sort of welcomed the absurdity as it was a welcome change from the sheer perversion of captivity. Regardless, after phoenix toad kill number one hundred forty-seven his work finally paid off. Sort of.

...

“I’m not telling you to test it, I’m just saying I can’t do so myself. I already tried, but my regeneration completely overpowers it given how healthy I am. If I was severely injured it would be different, but it’s shockingly difficult to hurt myself seriously without decent equipment.”

“D-did you r-really try to…n-nevermind. I’m w-willing to t-try.”

“Take some time and be certain. I know the magic is in here” he swished the crude cup full of pink liquid, “but I can’t be certain it will act the way I’m hoping.”

“N-no, I’m certain. N-not as if we have m-much choice.”

“We can find something else. It’ll just take time. Maybe a rogue healer or something.”

“W-we don’t have t-time. And y-you know we couldn’t afford a healer even if we c-could find one.”

“There’s always a workaround if you look hard enough.”

Oresus smiled gently. “N-no t-time. N-not for us.”

Gloe grinned in response. “Your funeral, I guess.” At Oresus’ confused look he shook his head in negation. “Nevermind. If you really want to do this, I’d recommend just taking a tiny little sip. We can always scale up.”

“R-right. Anything else?”

“Better sit down and let me hold the cup. This stuff was hard to make, no sense spilling it if you start thrashing around.”

“Is that l-likely?”

“It burns going down. And coming back up. Tch. And everywhere in between.”

“Oh.”

“Not too late to change your mind.”

“N-no. Let’s do it.” The nervousness was flowing off of Oresus, but he still put on a game face. The drink he took was quite miniscule indeed, and at first there was no result. Then the pain kicked in.

As predicted there was some thrashing, but Gloe was able to eat enough of the pain and fear to minimize it. More alarming was the way the blood began to drain from Oresus’ face. “No…so…tired” he wheezed. He began to slump in his seat, then to fall out of it.

That was not something Gloe had anticipated. He leaned in closer, trying to figure out what was happening. Then he realized Oresus’ faint shroud was gone, and it clicked. “Shit.” He laid the poor man down and leapt into the underbrush.

A few minutes later he was back, holding a wriggling, clawing bundle in one arm. He pinned the creature to the ground next to Oresus, ignoring its gnawing teeth. Pushing a knife into the man’s hand he leaned back in. “Oresus, you’re dying. You need to hold this knife and raise your hand before letting it drop. I’ll do the rest, but if you don’t manage to pick up the knife you’re going to die.”

Oresus’ eyelids fluttered and he tried to turn his head, instead just moaning. “Don’t worry about seeing. Just feel the knife handle. Pick it up. Don’t think about anything else. Just pick up the knife.”

Another groan and the fingers feebly wrapped around the hilt. “That’s it. Just pick it up. I’ll do everything else, but I can’t help you with that. You can do it.” The fingers twitched and flexed randomly. Gloe decided to become more proactive. He adjusted his consumption slightly, then shouted “This is where you die if you don’t pick up that damn knife!” The answering spike of fear gave a tiny bit of strength to the digits, and the blade rose slightly off the ground. “Higher!” It rose a bit more, then fell.

As it did so Gloe whipped the small creature in his hand into just the right position so that the blade went through its throat. He felt a tiny bit of life energy flow into him. Damn it. He was still getting credit…no wait. He could detect the barest wisp of shroud off of Oresus. They were splitting the life energy. He leapt into the brush, returning in moments with another restrained creature.

Once more he pressed handle to hand. “Again!” he demanded. And again, and again. As many times as it took.

...

“W-what happened?”

“I don’t know if any actual healing occurred, but the drink must have tried. It used your energy to get it done. Almost all of it, including your shroud.”

“M-my m-mana too. I see.”

“I’m not sure what that is.”

“I use m-mana to use m-my ability. M-my body m-makes it over time.”

“Oh.” Gloe paused in thought. “I don’t have that. My abilities are…different I guess.”

“It’s v-very bad to use up all y-your mana. Or y-your ki. Y-you could d-die.” He smiled slightly at that. “Oh.” After a moment he shook his head. “H-how did you h-help me? I s-sort of remember, b-but not clearly.”

“I helped you make kills. I was hoping the flow of new life energy would restore your shroud, and it did, just enough.” He leaned back against a tree and blew a raspberry. “Which is great, but we’re back to square one. This phoenix toad draught drains all you energy and doesn’t even heal you. Bah.”

They sat in silence for a while. “A-actually, my stomach doesn’t h-hurt anymore. It usually b-burns, and I always w-want to throw-up. M-my chest doesn’t h-hurt inside either.”

“Huh. Well maybe it did heal you a bit then. I didn’t see any signs of you being better, but I couldn’t account for internal injuries.” He perked up for a minute, then scoffed again. “Pah. What good is it if it kills you while healing you? Looks like we need a healer after all. Maybe I could sell hides or something. Some items from the woods must be valuable. If only we knew which.”

“I w-wonder if a m-mana potion would work?”

“Do they sell those?”

“Y-yes, but they’re s-somewhat expensive. They g-gave me s-some at the academy, b-before they realized I w-was a r-runt.”

“Huh. Probably cheaper than a healer though, eh?”

“Y-yes.” He smiled again. “L-less questions too. B-but it still w-would be a p-problem. Except…” he struggled to rise.

“You stay resting. Just tell me what you need.”

“M-my garden. T-tiny berries.” He held thumb and finger close together.

“Right.” Gloe dashed over to the thorny enclosure, carefully using the stick to pry the gate open. Those barbs were serious business. Inside he found a small bush bearing a handful of bright green and purple berries. They had some resemblance to a gooseberry. Taking one he re-secured the small plot and returned. “This one?”

“Y-yes.” Oresus popped it in his mouth, his face twisting a bit at the taste. After he had swallowed he smiled. “M-mana berry. I grew it s-so I could p-practice using m-my abilities more.”

His shroud was unchanged, but his color did seem to improve marginally. “How much mana does it replenish?”

“V-very little. W-we would need a l-lot. But if w-we had them y-your potion m-might work.”

“And you could grow more?”

“Y-yes. B-but they n-need special f-fertilizer. T-they only grow if I use the r-remains of certain creatures. M-maybe those t-that use m-mana? T-this grew f-from that c-cat thing.”

“Mauler Ocelots? Hmm. They do have a magical attack they use, that ranged slash thing. Most of the other creatures we eat are magic, but they don’t really use magical abilities. I can get you more of those with little problem. Are you sure you want to risk it though? If we are wrong, or if the doses are off you’ll die.”

Oresus rubbed his stomach and sternum, then looked up with another smile. “Y-yes.”