Alyssa couldn’t hear a damn thing from where she stood, thirty meters away. The only thing that could bridge that distance was gunfire. She fired off as many rounds as she could, hoping she’d get some kind of lucky double ricochet and nick the yappy elf.

It didn’t do anything. Kinesia manifested an explosive bolt in her hand and tossed it at Alyssa like a javelin. Alyssa had already removed a buckler from her hip. She draped a similar kind of deflection magic over it — spending a week of her life — and intercepted the bolt head-on, letting it fly into the air and explode. They both felt the shockwave.

“Isn’t it exciting!” Kinesia shouted, making sure Alyssa heard her over the rumbling in their chests. Alyssa had no interest in that, and just kept shooting. She made sure to keep some distance between them, however, as the elf had deep pockets filled with explosives — the sort of stuff that she’d cast like rice grains.

As the surroundings crumbled under the heavy exchange of fire between Alyssa and Kinesia, there was a shout from beyond the fog of war, under the bell tower of the cathedral. “By Lumina’s name, cease your criminal act!”

A formation of knights steadily advanced, hidden behind tower shields, spears jutting out. Kinesia turned around and frowned, letting Alyssa’s projectiles bounce off her back. “Get the hell out of my way!” she shouted, throwing an explosive bolt straight at the knights’ formation.

Jon expected them to blow up fantastically, but the bolt exploded over an invisible dome covering the formation, the dust and fire being swept away by the wind. “Rifles! Fire!” came the order, and a row of rifles poured against Kinesia. Jon joined in with a shot of his own. All the rounds bounced right off, ripping up the street all behind her — all, except one. A double ricochet from Jon’s shot managed to nick her in the ass. It was one of the least fatal places to be shot, but also one of the most undignifying.

Believing her wound to be inflicted by the knights, she reached into the air — her hand disappeared? She pulled her hand back, and out came with her hand was a bundle of...dynamite? No, those were sticks of fire stone.

She tossed the bundle right at the knights, exploding in a rippling, concussive wave that cut into the surrounding buildings on either side of the formation — but when the smoke cleared, the knights marched on, defiantly singing to a war tune. Tanky bastards — she tossed another one again! No more waiting for the dust to clear! She just kept tossing out explosives straight out of the spatial rip in the air adding insult to her assault with more explosive bolts flung from her other hand.

Somewhere between the twelfth and fifteenth explosion, the knights’ magical defense faltered; all it took was a single bundle to slip through. A bunch of the poor guys turned into mist without further register, coating their comrades behind them in red and black. Others were quick-witted enough to summon their personal defensive magics, expending entire decades of their remaining life at the first shake of a bomb going off right beside them.

A surprising number of knights survived, but all that was left of the formation was a ragtag bunch of men with chipped shields and half-burnt surcoats. The surviving riflemen, deaf from everything, fired a few token shots at Kinesia, the rounds pitifully bouncing off of her.

She was about to throw another bundle — the killing blow — but Jon took the opportunity to shoot the bundle in her hand before she threw it. It exploded in her hand, but she was prepared for these sorts of things. She blew away the dust with magic, revealing her to be unscathed. With the chaos of the battlefield, however, she had no way of telling if this was just bad luck, or if there was a marksman in this battle sniping her at all the worst opportunities!

Then there was Alyssa, still firing her guns even if she knew they had no effect on Kinesia, who casually tossed another explosive bolt at the pest. It landed on a building beside Alyssa, and she had to spend more of her life to protect herself from the ballistic debris. The impact of a particularly big chunk, however, stunned her, and she fell to the ground.

Jon saw his ally fall. She didn’t seem dead, but she would be in a few moments; Kinesia was already preparing another explosive bolt. He fired another shot, risking exposing his position to try and wound her before she could totally take out Alyssa...but he failed the double ricochet he was hoping for, and unfortunately for him, Kinesia saw the muzzle flash. She tracked the smoky trail his shot left behind to the roof he was on.

He made a run for it, barely making it out of the blast that soon knocked him down, consuming his former vantage point. He was on the ground, the air taken out of his lungs, but he was alive. He had to get off the roof and back to ground level; all the other buildings around him were nearly collapsing in on themselves, and he couldn’t rely on the apartment he was on to defy that same fate.

He climbed down a wooden ladder into the building, hurrying to find the stairs. His ally was in dire straits, and he’d prefer her alive. [Worry not.] — Ravena told him.

Alyssa was in a daze. It was hard to breathe or move her arms. She pushed herself up off the ground, steadying herself on shaky legs, but when she looked to Kinesia, the next explosive bolt was already barreling towards her to finish the job.

Before the bolt claimed her, a different light coalesced around her. The scene changed, and she found herself amidst wounded knights. There was an explosion, but it was far away. She scanned the scene. Kinesia was nowhere around, and with the knights and wounded laid out around her, this must have been some kind of nearby staging ground.

“You put me here, and you don’t say hi?” Alyssa said aloud.

“I’m right here.”

Alyssa turned around, finding the priestess right there. “I see some things in the Theater still stuck with you,” Alyssa said. Silently standing behind someone for five seconds before speaking up was just such a Theatrical thing to do.

“Hush. It’s not illegal,” the priestess said, “and Your Lady asked a favor of Our Goddess for this one, so don’t thank me. That aside, you seem to know the criminal’s weakness. She’s accumulating damage, and it’s not from us.”

“Yes, well, her defense can’t defend against the same object twice. Jon’s been getting her with double ricochets.”

“How difficult.”

Alyssa chuckled. “I know two people who can do it. The other one absolutely won’t charge towards danger, so he won’t be here.”

“And this ‘Jon,’ he’s still there?”

“Still back there.” I hope he’s alive.

“ ‘Can’t defend against the same object twice’ ... Is this not actually simple, then?” She’s vulnerable in close combat. “Captain!” the priestess called, “The criminal’s defensive magic cannot take a blade twice! Hack her down where she stands!”

The captain raised his cracked sword. “The priestess has handed us Lumina’s revelation! The enemy is vulnerable to blades! Ready your blades, men!”

“Hey, idiot” — Alyssa lightly slapped the priestess across the head — ”she’s not totally defenseless. She has explosives in her pockets and she doesn’t die from them. Put two and two together, would you?”

“Captain,” the priestess called before he could leave, “the criminal will deploy explosives like throwing bird feed across the plaza. Prepare for it.”

“Thank you, priestess.” The captain knocked his armored chest with his fist. “Leave it to us.”

Alyssa and the priestess watched the captain and his men march and disappear around the corner, singing war songs. “How reliable,” Alyssa said.

“Those are knights of the Order for you” — when the priestess faced Alyssa, she was already falling to her knees — ”Alyssa!”

She caught her, easing her down to sit on the ground.

“Don’t say my name like you know me,” Alyssa said. She winced as the priestess prodded her wounds, the mana from her Skills scanning every broken bone and cut artery.

“Everything in you is broken,” the priestess said, supporting Alyssa’s back to lay her down.

“That’s...true...”

“I’m putting you under. Stop speaking and let me do my work.”

“How...earnest...” Alyssa quieted as the priestess’s magic put her to sleep. Her final thoughts were for the hope that Jon would make it out alive. She would hate to wake up in a world without him — but she, too, had to live, or else he would once again be left alone.

Kinesia closed on the cathedral. Her clients were probably foaming at the mouth right about now, wondering why she’d gone ahead and attacked the Theater and the Order. They’d asked her to kill Alyssa and the Theater’s new guy, and she was glad to, but she wasn’t just here for the money.

The bell tower was in sight. She threw an explosive bolt at it, but it hit the edge of a massive barrier dome covering the whole cathedral.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

She clicked her tongue. The Sisters-divine can go to hell. Well, the iron gates were right ahead. For a backwater port city like Stave, the Order wouldn’t set up an absolute barrier. She just had to get past the iron fence, get inside the barrier, then she could wreak havoc as much as she’d like.

The Order’s knights appeared at the end of the road, blocking the front of the gate. There were fewer of them than Kinesia expected. Still, she remained on-guard. They were nine veteran knights donning gold-trimmed, full-plate armor. With no need for shields, each veteran held two-handed weapons to their personal tastes.

There was a tenth knight, one who wore a red cape, was most likely their most dangerous member — and their captain. It would be nice to take him out first.

Expecting a rain of explosives, they settled on a simple solution: speed. They charged with magic in their boots. These were men who knew that hesitation spelled death. Glad to know she and they were on the same page.

Kinesia dumped the contents of her storage and scattered them like rice grains, landing between the feet of honorable and valiant men. Some of them managed to bat the explosives back at her, but not enough. The blasts knocked half the knights to the ground, stalling the rest.

A token two, however, pushed beyond the smoke and raining debris, confident that their comrades behind them wouldn’t just die from something like that.

They were close, already 20 meters away. Kinesia threw explosive bolts at them, but they used Skills to deflect her attacks, blowing up the buildings beside them.

The first veteran used Charge to rush her, thinking he could tie her down, but no. Kinesia rolled out of the way, pulling out a hammer and a forward-curving short sword once she was upright. The second veteran charged at her, slashing across with a longsword, but he didn’t stop there. With his Skill, Whirlwind, his longsword infinitely maintained its momentum, allowing him to keep on slashing effortlessly.

The longsword outreached the criminal’s own weapons, giving the knight false confidence. Kinesia slashed at the air, obviously out of reach — but sending out a blade-shaped explosive magic at the knight!

He took the attack head-on, spending his own lifespan to reinforce his armor with magic just to take the hit. The raw force of it sent him flying and crashing through a building’s wall.

The first veteran, having recovered from his charge, thought he could land a sneaky hit from behind, attacking Kinesia overhead with the beak of his halberd. She merely turned and sidestepped, mocking the knight with her eyes, even as the pavement by her foot turned into dust under the crushing, magic-amplified force of the veteran’s attack.

She struck him under the jaw with her hammer, boosted with a dash of explosive force behind it. Even if the man’s helmet wrapped around his whole head, the force was enough to break his lower jaw and send his visor flying from the sheer shock. He fell backwards, rendered unconscious.

Three more veterans charged at her, including the captain. Their other comrades had been knocked out from the explosion, and they were all that remained.

She unleashed a shockwave with a single slash. The captain and a veteran were prepared to receive it, cleaving through the shockwave itself with magic-coated parries of their own. The other veteran only managed to take it by magicking his armor, but he was still knocked back, sending him skidding back across the road on his feet.

The captain and the veteran with him continued the charge, finally clashing with Kinesia. They traded blows — the captain with a spear, and the veteran with him, a poleaxe — but Kinesia’s long life and experience came to the fore, treating the knights’ attacks like they were choreographed theater displays rather than real attacks meant to kill. She coated her weapons in different explosive magics, extending her reach far beyond what the length of her weapons suggested, and whose attacks the knights desperately avoided, having witnessed the fate of their comrades.

The third knight finally caught up, cutting at her with a longsword, but even his arrival couldn’t turn the tables. All of Kinesia’s attacks had turned explosive by now, and already, a quarter of her hair had turned silver. The knight captain thought they could wage a battle of attrition here and force her to use up her entire lifespan — that was, if they could survive her barrage.

He noticed a pair of hunter’s eyes hiding in the rubble behind Kinesia, waiting for the perfect timing. No, they didn’t need to wage a battle of attrition. They just needed to buy time with their lives.

The knight with the longsword was the first to go. He realized their chances of victory were narrowing, and so he committed to a Charge attack from a blind spot. He flew forwards, almost reaching her — and yet, fear flashed through his eyes as she turned and stared at him.

Kinesia stepped aside and tapped his hand with the hammer, exploding them into bloody giblets and gauntlet shrapnel. He continued barreling forwards, hitting the ground and rolling until he slammed into a wall.

The captain thrusted at her head, forcing her to lunge and duck — putting her at just the right position for the other knight’s poleaxe to come down at her neck.

Madness flashed by her eyes, and only the captain saw it. He had no time to warn his last subordinate. He didn’t even have time to pull his spear back. He spent a decade of his life on a frontal magic shield.

Everything in front of him turned bright. He only heard the first millisecond of the blast; the rest went silent as his eardrums burst. He only felt himself tumbling through the air, then his back hit something — dented something. He opened his eyes; he only felt himself opening his eyes, but he still couldn’t see a damn thing. It was just all white. He couldn’t move a muscle.

He was still alive, at least. He might not be able to say the same for the rest of his men.

“Is that all!” Kinesia shouted, mocking the man embedded between the bars of the iron gate before the cathedral. She was at the vertex of a conical crater that demolished the entire stretch of road until the cathedral, taking all the buildings on either side with it. Three-fourths of her hair had already turned silver.

“Dogs of the Sisters!” she continued. “Must you be beholden to their whims! The Lady Herself once told me, ‘Live your life as you see fit’!” She laughed, crying at just how utterly amusing things had been. “‘Fixer of things’ my ass,” she scoffed. She took a step towards the cathedral, summoning and throwing an explosive bolt at the bell tower. It flashed, the sweet boom, the falling of debris, and the screams of the people in the belly of the beast reaching her ears soon after.

She kept walking. “Lumina makes things” — she threw another bolt at the cathedral, damaging a buttress — ”for Ravena to break!” She looked at the sky. “Look at me, you Old Lady! Don’t say this isn’t your fault!”

Ravena the Keeper

A tinker of sorts

She tries new things

Not everything works

[I never said it wasn’t.]

Kinesia gasped. The shadows of a message flittered at the edges of her vision. “After all this time...” She wanted to laugh, but what came out were tears, instead. “I thought you’d abandoned me!”

Kinesia the ranger

Keeper of flames

Of anger, resentment, and hate

99 years

Of hope and wishes

By the hundredth year

Vanished by ice and blade

Ravena the Keeper

Stoking the anger

Offered revenge

And unbridled power

“Show me the way,”

Kinesia said

Murdered the wicked

Until the end

When it was done

Ravena left her

The emptiness of vengeance

The curse of the Keeper

[Abandon? Even if you kill hundreds more, I never would. I may yet save you — Kinesia smiled through her tears — but, dear child, some parts are better replaced than patched forever.]

Kinesia’s heart dropped. She turned and, with her hand, deflected the knife and fist that came at her. With tears in her eyes, she swung down at Raven’s new reaper, but he was already behind her — and he’d already seen all her tricks.

She turned and hammered down. The ground exploded, but he was nimble. When she grew an explosive bolt in her hand, he batted it away with magic and a knife. When she reached through a wavering slice in the air, he kicked and broke her wrist against the edge of the portal. When she activated her ultimate magic, turning all her hair silver, he hooked her foot and knocked her onto her back, and all the fire she unleashed shot into the sky — where it hurt no one.

The pain that shot out from her breaking bones didn’t matter as much. The Lady had run out of patience. The Lady had lost hope in her. What greater loss was there, than to have your god lose faith in you?

Defeated in spirit, she slowly sat up, sobbing, wishing nothing more than to die. “Do it,” she said, still looking at the sky. Her silver hair slowly regained its former health. She twirled her hair around a finger, watching it go back to how it used to be.

She cried in anguish, in one expert motion drawing a dagger and stabbing it into her chest — but it stopped a millimeter short, stopped by a magic that wasn’t her own. She brought it against herself over and over, but not more successfully — no more closer to a release from this hell.

She threw away her dagger. “Just do it!” she cried, turning to Jon.

[She is entirely lost. Return her to me — a message revealed itself to Jon — I must reforge her myself.]

Ash landed on Kinesia’s head. Jon pulled out a pistol. “Don’t let Her decide your path, kin,” Kinesia said between sobs. “You’ll only regret it.” She turned her head away, showing him the back of her head.

⋮

***

[Kinesia Gaelwood was not my best work. You may lay claim to one of her Skills: Aerial Lockbox / Vengeance Eternal.]

[The other one seemed like a good idea at the time. Well, you’re not the type of man with any lingering interest in that kind of life, no? This is the only one in the world. I’ll be taking it back now.]

Name: Jon Fuze

Level: 5

Kills: 54 → 55

Kills to Next Level: 4 / 25 → 5 / 25

Skill Proofs: 2

| Skill Claims |

> Hastened Sight (Unlocks Lvl. 10)

> Aerial Lockbox (Unlocks Lvl. 15)

| Skills |

> Summon Scribetool (Tier 1)

> Perfect Motion (Tier 1)

***