Lyria stalked forward with her Basilisk’s Shield and sword drawn. Her posture was defensive and ready.

I could tell she was nervous, but I thought it was important to push her just as much as I was pushing myself.

“You really think this is necessary?” Lyria asked without taking her eyes from the tunnel ahead.

“I think we both need to learn to fight in life-or-death situations. The more we do it, the calmer we’ll feel. And that calm might be an advantage that saves our lives down the line. Besides, it’ll be the fastest way to level up.”

She sighed. “This is insane.”

“Hey,” I said. “On the bright side, you have an ability that’ll save you from death for ten seconds. That means I’ve got plenty of time to save your ass if things go wrong.”

“That’s super comforting, Brynn. Thank you.” From her tone, I suspected she didn’t actually appreciate my point.

I meant what I said, though, about facing life-or-death situations. Little by little, my experiences on Eros had already numbed me slightly to the peril. So long as I didn’t let myself forget that death was a real possibility, I thought a little bit of numbness would do us both good.

To get stronger, we were going to have to face terrifying situations day after day. I would rather tackle them with ice in my veins than with fear pounding in my skull.

It helped that it had been fun to finally see my abilities and items come together in the last two fights. They had been more like dancing than struggling. Between juggling my spells, tactical thoughts, and the body awareness to keep attacking and defending, there hadn’t been much time for thinking. In some ways, those fights reminded me of the point when I finally got the hang of a particularly difficult game—that first encounter where it all clicked, and I knew everything ahead would be that much easier.

This was like the ultimate game, where the skill-ceiling was limitless, and the stakes were everything. Deep down, I knew there was too much real danger and suffering in this world to condense it down to such a simple thought. But for now, I didn’t need to worry about technicalities. I just needed to survive, and any little mental trick I could muster was fair game. The more I thought of it like a challenging game, the easier it was to stay focused on what I needed to do to get stronger.

I watched Lyria continue forward as we passed through a sphere of torchlit tunnel and into one of the dark patches between.

If she was really Soulbound, she might have truly incredible potential. The sooner she could realize what she was capable of, the better. For both of us. Overwhelming competence was a pretty good shortcut to battling fear, after all.

Even though I was confident in her abilities to handle this fight, I was still nervous. Watching my friend risk her life had me more frightened than I’d been to risk my own. Go figure. Only one of us had a temporary get-out-of-death free card, too.

I was above half mana and slowly working on recovering it as we walked. I had started thinking of my two mana recovery methods by name. I thought about the one I learned from Circa as “Peace.” I was calling the one I had discovered on my own “Pain.”

Peace was as simple as clearing my thoughts and becoming calm. Pain was more like ripping the mana from the air and forcing it inside me, stretching and stressing the pathways inside my body.

To the best of my knowledge, meditating with Peace was a fast recovery method, and not much else. If there were any permanent benefits, I couldn’t detect them. So I tried to save using Peace for emergencies.

Using the Pain meditation method slowly but surely increased my maximum mana capacity. I believed it was also opening up my pathways in a way that was letting me pump more fuel into my abilities, but I was less certain of that. Using Pain also felt like somebody had rubbed my insides with spicy food. Everything burned and ached for the duration of it, and even for some time afterwards.

I still meditated with Pain whenever I could get away with it. After all, learning to deal with discomfort was a kind of training, too.

Since I knew Lyria was about to put herself in danger, I was using Peace as we walked, hoping to top off as much of my mana as possible—just to be safe.

We found the nightmaw within minutes. It was ripping into the wall, roaring in frustration as the small, hidden tunnel on the other side collapsed. I thought I heard a sound coming from the tunnel, but it was quickly masked by the roar of the angry nightmaw.

Lyria shot me a look. I gestured toward the nightmaw, as if I was letting her step through a doorway first instead of encouraging her to attack a beast almost twice her level.

She licked her lips, banged her sword against her shield, and then called mana to herself.

I watched what she was doing with my mana sense, admiring the ease with which she seemed to weave together threads of magic and turn them to wind that rushed upward, creating a wall of green-tinged disruption in front of her entire body.

The nightmaw crouched low as it faced her, long arms spread and claws bared. I still hadn’t seen another nightmaw with one of the dark mana crystal arms. The one I soloed hadn’t even had any crystals on its body. I wondered if that one had been more of a rare spawn, or some kind of “elite.”

My thoughts were interrupted when the monster charged at Lyria, falling to all fours like a wolf.

Once close, it jumped, sailing the final few feet through the air as it swiped for Lyria’s head.

Lyria ducked beneath the nightmaw, sticking her sword upward and skewering it as it sailed over her head. The nightmaw’s momentum carried it forward, turning the stab wound into a long gash on its hairy, matted belly.

Blood splashed down over Lyria.

The nightmaw landed and rolled to its feet. Without my Viperlilly poison, I had my first chance to see how fast these things healed. The gaping wound on its belly was already done bleeding and closing up.

It got to its feet, spread both arms, and charged at Lyria like it wanted to tackle her.

Lyria fell backwards from the weight of the attack, but her Wind Wall acted like a frictionless barrier, causing the nightmaw to slide up and over her body instead of landing on top of her.

It skidded on its belly in the dirt behind her.

Before it could stand, Lyria was on her feet and stabbing down through the nightmaw’s back. Once. Twice. Thr—

The nightmaw rolled and swung, knocking the sword away so hard that it was embedded blade-first into the wall. She barely got her shield up in time to parry the second swipe with a thump that sent her skidding two feet to the side.

She plucked her sword from the wall, ducked another blow, and blasted a quick jet of wind at one of the nightmaw’s legs. It nearly lost its footing, giving her a chance to stab it in the face.

The beast roared, trading blows with her when it could manage to land them through her Wind Wall. Most of its attacks were deflected through a combination of rushing wind and a slight duck or pivot from Lyria. When those failed, she bashed them away with her shield.

She was doing damn well, but the nightmaw was three times her size and healing faster than she could hurt it.

The nightmaw caught her arm, squeezing and drawing a frustrated shout from Lyria, who dropped her sword and slammed her shield down, edge-first, again and again on its arm until it let her go.

She barely raised the Basilisk Shield in time to parry another strike. Each blocked attack made her skid backward, driving long grooves into the dirt. She was panting hard, and her mana was draining rapidly.

Lyria’s shield shimmered, and the nightmaw was suddenly encased in stone.

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She darted forward, moving behind the nightmaw like she wanted to climb up and stab it in the back of the head or neck, maybe.

But the stone crumbled away and it immediately spun, catching her mid-air as she leaped for her attack.

It gripped her by the ankle, pivoted, and flung her like a human missile at the wall. If it wasn’t for her Wind Wall still rushing, she would’ve hit head-on. Instead, the wind slowed her impact and rotated her so she landed like she was performing a belly flop.

There was a deafening crunch as a cloud of dust exploded from the impact point.

“Lyria!” I shouted as I ran toward the fight, probing her for injuries with my mana sense as I ran. The mana sense wasn’t a perfect tool to detect injury, but I could feel where things were wrong, even if I couldn’t see what.

The dust cleared, and I could see Lyria was coughing and rising to her hands and knees.

She had lost her weapon and shield from the impact.

When I looked inside her for injuries, I found dark spots that were scattered and thin. They were all over, like bruising and some slight bleeding. To my surprise, nothing looked like it was putting her in immediate danger. I doubted her death avoidance ability had even kicked in.

I felt at her mana core, sensing that she was definitely low on mana, but not dry.

I had been running, but I slowed to a stop.

Give her a chance, Brynn. Let her prove she can handle this.

Lyria looked toward me, and I thought there was a touch of panic in her eyes.

I gave her a firm look, nodding my head slightly to encourage her. This was the kind of moment she needed. She needed to see that I still believed in her, even when it looked like there was no hope left. This was the kind of moment that would push her to get stronger, both mentally and physically. And when there inevitably came a time when she thought all hope was lost, she could look back on this and draw strength from it.

I hoped.

The Wind Wall snapped off suddenly.

What are you doing, Lyria?

I reached inside her, ready to flood her with healing at a moment’s notice.

The nightmaw pounced again, tackling her in a bear hug that looked strong enough to crush bones. It landed hard on her, but a second later, there was a hiss and a pop sound.

A red mist shot out of the nightmaw’s back, followed by compressed wind that was blowing chunks of the beast’s body up so hard they were hitting the cave ceiling and sticking.

More hisses and pops rang out as jet after jet of compressed air exploded through the nightmaw’s body.

In panic, it clawed at Lyria, but the fresh wounds only opened up new jets of deadly air.

It was over in seconds.

The combined force of all the air ripped dozens of holes in the nightmaw as it was launched off Lyria’s body, spinning, spraying gore, and then landing a few feet away in a ruined heap.

Lyria got up, dripping blood and holding one eye closed. Red was streaking down her face from her scalp, but she was smiling. The blood was even on her teeth. She looked around, as if suddenly wondering where her weapons were.

She tried to kneel down to pick up her sword, but tipped over face-first and would’ve landed hard, but I was already there to catch her.

I eased her down, already using the last of her mana to heal the worst injuries to her head.

I tried not to think too hard about whether those deadly jets of air could still come bursting out of her injuries. The fact that they stopped shooting when the nightmaw was off her seemed like a good sign, though.

Lyria gave me a sleepy thumbs up. “I got him. Solo,” she grinned. “Wish my mom could’ve seen that.”

“You were awesome. Scared the shit out of me, but you were awesome.”

She smiled as she let me drip some healing potion between her lips. She swallowed, sighed, and accepted more. I fed her as much as I could until I sensed the dark spots inside her had stopped responding.

“Gotta wait for more,” I said. “It only works up to a point.”

She nodded her head, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. “I think I can stand, now. You can stop holding me like a baby.”

I grinned, letting her off my thighs and scooting back as she sat up. She rubbed at the back of her head. “So you really have to use all my mana to heal me? I feel like there’s not a drop left.”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t leave me much to work with. You and Thorn both… It’s like trying to wash a car with a cup of water.”

“A car?” Lyria asked.

“Nevermind,” I said. “We should probably get back. If we make it before they wake up, we won’t have to explain what we were doing. We can just… rub a little dirt on all that blood and get you cleaned up, good as new.”

Lyria winced as she stood and swayed a little on her feet.

“Here,” I said, offering her an arm to lean on.

Lyria looked reluctant, but seemed like she needed the help. She was favoring her leg, which was still dark and clouded with injuries. I had saved it for last, focusing instead on her head and torso. The Healing Potion seemed to work differently, as if it applied a blanket amount of healing to the entire body. The more injuries, the less it healed each individual injury.

I imagined if somebody was stabbed in one place, a single Healing Potion could possibly fix it completely. But if they were stabbed a dozen times, it might only slightly close up the deepest part of all the wounds, or maybe even a few.

It gave me more appreciation for my Devour Mana ability. Being able to direct my healing to specific areas was a huge perk compared to having no choice. I could ignore superficial wounds entirely and focus on potentially mortal wounds first.

“Did you let it tackle you on purpose?” I asked as we were walking.

“No,” Lyria said, “I lost concentration on Wind Wall and then froze up a little.”

I stopped walking a second to stare at her. “Seriously? I thought you had a master plan and that was all on purpose.”

She swallowed, shaking her head. “Uh, yeah. No. I was scared shitless. I thought I was going to die and you were going to just watch it happen.”

“I was ready to jump in,” I said.

“You didn’t think the part where I got ragdolled by a nightmaw was the time to jump in?”

“I considered that point,” I admitted. “But I believed in you. I don’t think you give yourself enough credit, and I’ve seen you in action enough times that I thought you’d figure it out. Still, I could feel your injuries. They were… manageable.”

She snorted and started walking again, leaning heavily on me as she did. “Easy for you to say. I felt like my insides were jelly.”

“So that Venting Wounds ability is passive, but you can decide to use it or not?” I asked.

“No,” Lyria said. “I didn’t intentionally shut it off. It just happened on its own.”

I frowned. “That’s odd. You still had mana.”

She shrugged. “If I’m ever aggressively spraying wind out of my wounds and you want to help me, just do it from a distance. I’ve seen you project stuff out of your hands pretty far before.”

I laughed. “Yeah. I'll just spray Healing Potion from fifty feet away and aim for your mouth. And then I’ll hope none of the pressurized gusts of air blow the liquid off-course. I think I’d be better off just using Devour Mana to drain you dry and then I can approach safely. Lucky for you, it works from a distance, even if it feels slightly less mana efficient.”

“Lucky for me,” she agreed.

My words made me think about a potential use I hadn’t considered yet for Devour Mana. With Viperlilly draining an enemy's health, I could, theoretically, use Devour Mana to heal the injuries. If I was fighting an enemy who relied on mana, it would be like giving Viperlilly a “mana drain” option I could toggle, assuming I had enough concentration to spare.

The detonation would still be devastating, and I could possibly magically cripple my foe and make surviving the two minutes that much easier.

I would keep that one in the back of my mind for later.

“Lyria…” I said.

“Yeah?”

“There’s this group of people I’ve been watching on my map. Two Irons and this sort of… half-Iron, half something else dot.”

“Yeah, I remember you mentioning them.”

“Well, I think they’re coming down this passageway soon. They’ve been methodically clearing every passage this whole time, and ours is next if they stick to the same pattern. I’ve watched them pass people without apparent issues, but I don’t like it. It feels like… like they’re looking for something. I can’t think of why else they’d be moving in the pattern they’re moving.”

Lyria’s expression darkened. “You think they’re looking for you?”

“I don’t know. It’s possible, right? Somebody could have recognized me and spread word that I came in here.”

“No more soloing for now,” she said suddenly. “I want you to keep your mana as high as possible. Understand me, Brynn?”

“Yeah. That was already the plan. I knew I’d have enough time to recover before they caught up. And I wanted a chance to get in this last bit of practice before we… may have to confront them.”

“You said this passage dead-ends, right? There’s no way to sneak past them?”

“Right. If they come down here, we’re going to be stuck meeting them head-on. Unless we could use those hidden passages without them collapsing. Thorn said Zahra led them through before. But one of the hidden passages to our tunnels has vanished. The only one left leads straight to the dungeon guardian’s lair…”

“Of course it does,” Lyria sighed. “We can worry about that if we survive these three Irons.” She tapped her bloody chin in thought. “Do you still have that net?”

“Yeah, but all three are above Wood. That means the Lay Down ability is more likely to be resisted by them, even if I managed to catch any of them with the net.”

“It might still be worth keeping in mind,” she said.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Let’s get back to the others for now, get you rested up again, and I’ll keep an eye on my map.”

I had a rough plan forming, but I wasn’t sure any amount of planning could bridge the power gap between a group of five Woods and a group of three Irons if those guys were coming to hurt us.

Damn it. I needed to think of something. And fast.