A face crumpled on the edge of a bloody axe. Eyeballs popped out, teeth scattered, a head concaved, and Kankraa felt absolute joy. The rush of battle consumed him. Eyes of madness burned as he smashed into another guard, then another. Their heads, a mash of blood and brains on the floor. The orc put up his axe and a bullet bounced off the gold. A swing threw the pole metres away and split a guard in half. Kankraa tuned to the gold with Levitation. Guiding with a hand, he sliced three more slavers in a row. A desperate guard came with a sword. Aura blazed on his weapon and he swung at Kankraa's knees.

“You're brave. I will leave you be.” An imbued finger flicked the guard's head and he fell unconscious in a slump. “Sleep well.” A giant hand was held outward and the pole axe returned with a thunk. More guards round the corner with rifles, lining up on their marks. The giant charged forward, barreling at the slavers with glee.

Riw chirped to his friends. They squirmed and stared at Elkan with distrustful glares. Their collars clinked as they hugged each other in fear of the masked human. Riw pointed at Elkan and he took the hint. A hood was taken off, his mask was pulled down and Elkan revealed his dark skin. They cheered with glee, rushing to be helped. Elkan peeked at the several thousand Fenni that surrounded him. All scuffed and ill-kept, not a child or woman in sight.

He sighed and rubbed his forehead. “Better get to work.”

Drac pulled out his blade from the last guard. The familiar pools of blood surround him. A whip of the blade and blood licked the ground.

NOT ENOUGH.

An agonising headache filled Drac's head and he held his head in pain. The pang vanished as soon as it came, leaving Drac confused.

Did you hear that, Axton?

Hear what?

Like grasping a cloud, the thought disappeared as he was about to hold it.

I…dont know…

Heavy feet thumped behind. Kankraa walked up to Drac, pulling an unconscious guard onto the red ground.

“Here, Boss.”

“Had fun?”

“A lot of it. What do you need the human for?”

“Answers.”

Drac took off his rucksack to fetch a vial. The cap popped open and he wafted its scent near the guard's nose.

“Knocked him hard, you did.”

“Don’t blame me for the weakness of this pink weakling.”

They woke up in a sweat. Breathing hard as if awoken from a nightmare. He looked around and found himself in a new one.

“Answer. Who are your employers?”

“T-the M-m-mountworths!”

A familiar name…

The Count! His family seems deep in the muck.

“Are there any more guards?” The guard nodded rapidly.

“Continue.” The air shuddered with Drac’s aura.

“Oh, neat trick; let me try.” The earth quaked and a guard paled before the green giant’s aura.

“Northeast of here! They left to get rest at the Fenni!”

“They are after their families,” Elkan said from afar. Fenni stood behind him by the thousands. Red lines marked their collarless necks.

“The men stayed while mostly women and children left for a secure place.”

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

“Then they went hunting for them. Great! More fun to be had! Glory to be claimed!”

Elkan dissipated into flecks of light, and an empty spot in Drac’s soul felt filled once more.

Drac stared down at the guard with darkened eyes.

“How many are on their way there?”

“About a hundred.”

All Aura users. This isn't the same as a slave pit. We are not slaughtering weak nobles.

It matters not. My blade will tear through their necks the same.

“Why?” Drac asked the weeping guard.

“I-I-I don't know! We just do what she tells us. Please spare me!!” The guard said between weeps. Tears dropped like the cave's waterfall.

Fury swallowed Drac. Anger like this had not entered his soul since Foushire. A gloved hand grabbed the guard's brown hair.

“If you wanted mercy, you should’ve chosen a different profession.” Ignis burned brightly in his palm. A burning skull screamed until blackened skin revealed bone. Drac let go of the guard's hair, making the charred corpse crack into ash on the floor. With a quick dusting of the hands, Drac stood up and continued like normal.

Elkan…

I know. I will check.

"Kankraa, ask him the way. I go ahead. Reach them quicker than any of you.”

Kankraa relayed what Drac said and the Fennon spoke.

“Riw wants to show the way to the burrow; he wants to fight with you.”

Riw chomped into a fruit while handing over one to Drac. Drac took the radiant fruit with gratitude. He took a bite and energy zoomed through his body. The mark on his cheek healed completely. His stamina was replenished whole.

Now this shit is worth having slaves for!

Axton…

What?

“Tell Riw to climb me and show me the way.”

Puffy clouds parted ways for the cold moon. Its silver light shone on the man in black from behind. Ventus hovered the weightless man above the trees and the lantern light below. Blades chinged as the Fennon pulled out his twin daggers wrapped in animal hide.

“Find your people.”

The Fennon chirped and jumped off Drac’s back to land on a nearby treetop. Drac descended below the tree line. About a hundred leather-armoured adventurers gathered in front of a hole in the ground under a tree’s root. With his feet light and silent, Drac landed on a branch above the crowd. He tuned Auditus.

“Any other way in?”

“No Sire. There is only one entrance. Meaning, if we can’t get in, with us out here, they can't get out.”

“Starve ‘em out. We will get our pelts soon.”

“But not soon enough! We have to get the foxes collared and prepared for the miss or our heads are on the chopping block.”

Adrenaline rose as he unsheathed his Heilong. Its beautiful silver blade reflects moonlight. A step created splinters as he zoomed with pulse to the forest floor. A guard's head spun in the air and the others turned with horrified faces at the sudden appearance of the assailant.

“I must apologise to your miss. Your heads will roll by my hand.”

Drac's hand rummaged through his inside jacket pocket and he threw out rune engraved daggers. Three of the Mountworth guards, stabbed in the chest, detonated in a blast of flames. Drac ignored the screams as he ran into the chaos of fire, blocking a blade as he ran. Another Heilong formed his left hand to dig deep into a guard’s rib. Ventus blew the body off the blade and the left heilong intercepted a bayonette. Guided down to jab the ground, it stuck.

Axton’s connection grew strong.

A flurry of cuts with the left carved the stuck man. His diced body fell and Drac moved on with a pulse on his light feet. More runes were thrown, and more bodies exploded into bloody messes of organs and bones. A fireball hit Drac’s Murus at his five. The barrier broke. While dropping under an attacking bayonet, he sliced an aura wave at the mage, severing the spellcaster's arm.

A clunky sword came for Drac’s stomach. Cleaving through Murus, it met Drac's Heilong, causing the air to burst into a cloud. Drac struggled even with Aura's imbued arms.

“Die!” The black-clad warrior screamed. Using amazing strength, the guard threw him back a few metres. Ventus and Levitation paused him in the air before he collided with a tree.

“Another gladus, I presume.”

Blood vessels bulged on his head as Gladus screamed in grief. The beefy man slammed down his heavy sword on the terra. The ground shattered as his aura shot at Drac with a towering wave. As guards surrounded him with swords flared with aura, there was only one option that made sense.

Elkan’s connection grew stronger.

Sheathing his sword, his two fingers glow brightly with a white aura.

The aura split the ground as it came for Drac.

Drac drew with trailing light into the air.

Aura blew away the wind, its heat searing Drac’s skin.

With all his might, he turned to the rune mark in the air.

The gladus looked around in the dust. After searching through the smashed trees in the aftermath of the aura wave, no remains of the masked assailant can be found.

A guard ran to the Gladus, holding a lantern. “Sir, I think he ran.”

“Search Harder!” Said the Gladus, looking over the trees, broken from his strike. “He blocked my blow…The aura wave wasn't enough to do him in.”

Blood dripped on his face and the lantern clanked on the ground. The anxious gladus turned to his left with his hand on his sword grip. Cold eyes stared at him under a black hood. His guard trembled and bled with a knife made of blue Murus stuck in his neck.

The man in black bit into a glowing fruit as a person dies. “Of course, it wasn’t.”