To be special was a lonely thing.

As a young girl, Kierra didn’t realize how different she was. She ran, jumped, and hunted small critters with careless joy. Being a little faster and a little stronger than the other children didn’t enter her mind. The adults hardly cared at that age either.

But as she grew older, the gap between her abilities and those of her peers widened. Her senses could rival the hounds some of the hunters raised, something she discovered when she jokingly joined in on their training. She could hear conversations in other rooms, until her mother soundproofed the tree after Kierra barged in on an intimate moment, thinking her mother had been ambushed by a predator. She could play all day long and sometimes through the night.

The moment she learned of her pure affinity was filled with wonder. Some villages used spells like the one her Lou showed her in the human capital, using affinity stones to divine the nature of a being’s mana. Kierra’s village used a different method. They used a spell that expelled one’s mana into the air and an observer judged their affinities through its color.

Normally, the technique didn’t have an effect, the mana useless without the direction of a spell. Pure affinities were different. The mana was tied to the caster’s will, meaning it always had direction.

The green energy stimulated the field she stood on, the short grass doubling in length and wrapping around her ankles. She vividly remembered the way the coarse blades tickled as they brushed against her skin, but what she remembered most about that day was her mother.

Morgene Atainna was not a kind woman. Or a soft one. Before Kierra understood concepts like power or prestige, she knew her mother was special. People treated her differently. They moved out of the way when she walked, they spoke to her carefully, and no one, not even the queen, her older sister, questioned her.

Her mother didn’t give praise easily. She was never impressed with Kierra’s small accomplishments. Her daughter being better than other children was natural, expected. Kierra showed potential but that meant nothing to a legend whose name was known in every corner of every province. It would take much more than snuffling the ground alongside pups to impress the leader of Dusk’s martial forces.

She was also a perfect example of the elven philosophy of pursuing strength through conflict. If Kierra bragged about doing better than the other children, Morgene arranged for her compete against those older than her. Bringing back a hunting trophy resulted in her being thrown outside with instructions to return with the skull of something stronger and fiercer. It seemed as though nothing would ever budge the woman’s stone-faced disapproval.

Kierra thought she’d never see it lest she climbed to the highest branch of the Great Tree and fought off an entire army of elder wyverns. But it didn’t. That day, when her mother witnessed her magic, her expression changed. She smiled, which was rare enough, but there was nothing else. Something in her eyes. It took Kierra several hours of looking back on the moment to realize it was pride.

Her mother was proud of her.

That was enough for her to realize how special she was but not the true scope of what she could do. It took decades of growth, both as a fighter and a person, to understand the true ramifications of her affinity. What it meant to the living embodiment of the physical affinity, the power contained within all living things; evolution.

It meant being the pinnacle of nature, endless growth combined with a vitality so strong it could overcome the effects of time. Every day, her magic responded to her desire to become strong, to grow. It seeped into her bones, transforming her. A slow but constant effect that matched her natural regeneration, as she subconsciously didn’t want to leave herself vulnerable. It would never stop and, as she grew her mana core, it would happen faster.

For the first century of her life, that meant she would have an edge. In a few centuries? She’d be overwhelmingly powerful. In a few millenia, if her mind didn’t collapse under the weight of so many years?

She’d be an existence beyond understanding.

The first time Kierra understood the path she walked was ten years after she learned of her affinity. Her childhood friends, or rather competitors as their relationships were mostly based off their mutual training, refused to spar with her.

It wasn’t meant to be hurtful. There was nothing to learn from an opponent they couldn’t so much as touch. She didn’t wallow in the moment, as her mother immediately had her training under the village’s stronger fighters, but during a quiet night, Kierra realized it was only a matter of time until she outgrew them. Only a matter of time before she outgrew them all and her only equals were dragons.

The more of that truth she understood, the bleaker the future looked. Yet, she couldn’t stop fighting, couldn’t stop growing. Her affinity was a reflection of who she was. She hunted, she challenged, and she evolved. Knowing her journey would end in a lonely peak made her more reckless, more flippant with certain matters, and more impulsive in others, but nothing short of death could stop her.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

She would be the best, whatever the cost.

In her prison, Kierra truly embraced her lonely fate. It was a prelude of her future. She felt herself fading, losing touch with anything beyond her cage. She didn’t want to care, as she’d outgrow it all anyway. But before she could give up, the Great Spirit smiled on her. Fate gave her Lou.

A partner that could walk the road she thought she’d was meant to travel alone. An eternal challenge in the form of a peak she’d never reach. A lover that shared her passions. The confused creature she stumbled on that fateful day in the Enchanted Forest was everything she’d ever wanted. Everything she’d ever need.

Quicker than she could have ever anticipated, Lou became her equal. One day, she’d be Kierra’s goal. For now, she was the elf’s treasure. Her precious project to be nurtured until she embraced her potential. So was her clan, the people that would help her support and care for Lou.

Kierra wasn’t a wrathful person. Following the model of her mother and constantly being around more experienced fighters matured her beyond her years. She also had the unique perspective of an immortal, even as a young one. Few grudges were worth the bother when she would watch the person turn to dust.

She was, however, a possessive person. Over the course of her life, people came and went with startling frequency, but her possessions lasted. They stayed with her so long as she cared for them. One thing guaranteed to earn her ire was someone damaging what was hers.

Her clan was both her possessions and the companions she never thought she’d have. She didn’t have words to express how much they meant to her. And the guild had laid hands on them. They had taken her flower and they’d hurt her treasure. Because of them, Lou would be changed and Kierra couldn’t say if it was for the better. Even if it was, it wasn’t their place to do so. Worst of all, they’d done it for ridiculous reasons, the ephemeral concepts of self-determination and wealth.

It was a given that Kierra was angry. Angrier than when she realized the true scope of her mother’s punishment. Angrier than she’d ever been in her life.

She didn’t enjoy killing. She did enjoy the hunt and she made good use of her prey, but she didn’t kill pointlessly. Kierra felt joy in the moment of the hunt but there was nothing but grim certainty in her heart as she stalked the streets of Quest.

This was not a fight to improve herself or obtain resources. Kierra came to the city to reap lives.

She didn’t have to take much care to go unnoticed, as the defenders of the city were beyond preoccupied. Her Lou was also angry, angry enough to forsake her secrets. She was destruction incarnate. Now weapon could harm her. Magic flowed over her glossy surface like water off a blade. Her assault was ceaseless and indiscriminate, overwhelming power that shattered the supposedly stout will of the hunters like a rock thrown against glass.

Kierra was a green blur as she ran and leaped through the chaos. Unlike her lover, she didn’t have endless stamina. She could decimate the weak members she spotted darting through the falling debris but that would be a waste of her limited mana. Her targets were those with the skill or competence to escape the onslaught.

It wasn’t about challenging her abilities. The master casters of Harvest were lacking on their best days. Frightened, confused, and ravaged by sickness, they didn’t make for a proper hunt. She might have faced the tiniest amount of resistance if she targeted the physical casters, with their strong bodies and faster reflexes, but they were irrelevant. The kingdom valued its casters far more than its martial fighters and she was there to make them hurt.

Kierra stalked the ones throwing around the flashiest magic, drew her bow, notched an arrow, and waited. Waited until they stooped over to catch their breaths, until their clutched their chests while enduring the pain of mana strain, until they were busy shouting orders, or until they were distracted forming a complex spell.

Then she would channeled her magic and pulled back the string of her bow till the slightest bit of more pressure would make it snap. Then she fired. One arrow for each target. She didn’t have the time to collect them with her prey rapidly fleeing her hunting grounds, so she left before their corpses hit the ground. Disappearing like an apparition.

She left the estate with thirty-eight arrows in her quiver. With a second limiting factor, she had to be even more selective. Painstakingly so. She was the invisible hand that snatched away the hunters’ best and brightest before disappearing. In her wake she left panic, the guilds crumbling faster as she took out their pillars.

She was skilled but it was impossible for her to go unnoticed forever. As she stalked her fourteenth target, special instincts honed by years of getting smacked about by her mother in a poor imitation of sparring nudged her. She threw herself to the side and rolled to her feet, looking back to see long, thin metal spikes embedded into the ground where she’d been crouched…but no enemy.

Her instincts nudged her again and she sidestepped, ducked, and leaped away, dodging more of the spikes. She couldn’t pinpoint the source of the magic but the projectiles were laughably slow, at least for her. She scoffed as she grabbed the next spike out of the air.

“Come out, little mouse,” she taunted, waving the rod in the air. “I am losing interest in this game.”

The taunting was a pointless gesture to disguise her true intentions. Her eyes glowed as she boosted her senses with magic, searching for her opponent. But to her surprise, her taunting had an effect.

The space in front her rippled and a man appeared in front of her. He was small in stature, two heads shorter than her with a wiry frame, and was dressed all in black, face hidden by a dark mask. Bright blue eyes stared out from underneath the many layers and Kierra was surprised not to see fear in them. She was less surprised to find she recognized his scent.

“I remember you. The prey that got away the night I killed the firebug. I did not take you for a brave man after the way you ran.”

“…you spared me,” he spoke, voice soft and muffled. “I couldn’t fight you then, but I can now. You spared me. For that, I offer you the same. Go, now.”

She chuckled, amused and angered in equal measure. “Good. I wondered what made you fools brave enough to target an Atainna. Show me what you can do, one who does not deserve to be called a hunter.” She placed her bow across her back and palmed two knives. “Show me, so I can break everything you are.”