“Longest dream I’ve ever had,” I muttered sourly. The others had all tried to convince me that I wouldn’t wake up from it. They had freaked out about what to do, then cursed whoever had abducted us, then freaked up some more. It felt all very pointless and annoying, especially when they didn’t let me lie down to the grassy ground to take a nap. They had eventually concocted a plan for getting down the hill, and so here I was, watching the guys – Teva’ryn, Simon, and Pell – chase the six-legged rabbits in the distance. They had already killed three of them, but any extra catch would serve us well as distraction for the gnomes.

“Lift it higher Randel, I almost got it!” Imaya yelled. I pushed the wooden board upwards and she attacked the other end with her dagger, prying the last rusty nail loose. With a sharp splintering sound the board came free, and I tossed it down to our growing pile of wood. Phew! I was getting tired just from dismantling this derelict shed.

“Help with this one too,” Tamara said, and I stifled a groan as I walked over to her. Although she was a bit pushy, I could appreciate her focus on the task at hand. Out of our little group, Pell had taken being kidnapped the hardest; the big guy was a bundle of nervous energy. Simon seemed to be anxious too, though he made a valiant effort to hide it. The girls, however? Tamara was calm and composed, always thinking about the next step ahead. As for Imaya … well, Imaya was actually excited.

Then there were the two Sylven, of course. Apart from the name of their species, I hadn’t learned much about our blue companions yet; my focus had been on explaining our escape plan. Some cultural differences were undeniably present, but fortunately the Sylven were intelligent enough to take them in stride. We only had one minor altercation so far, when Simon tried to hand Devi’lynn a rusty dagger. The Sylven girl wasn’t allowed to hold any tools or weapons, and Teva’ryn had been very insistent on this. He had even forbidden her to help us dismantle the shed.

Needless to say, I was envious down to my bones. Where was my prince to exempt me from work? I hated this masochistic dream with passion. Devi’lynn sat on the grass close by, watching us sweat and struggle, her delicate features set in a way that made me think she was pouting. Seriously, pouting! Who on Earth pouted at the opportunity to skip work? These blue elves were indeed strange creatures.

“I think this’ll be enough,” I said when we took down the last of the easy-to-reach boards.

“I think so too,” Tamara agreed, which took me by surprise. She brushed a lock of blonde hair out of her eyes, then looked up at the sky. “The sun is setting soon, and we don’t want to spend the night on this hill. Not without water. We’re already getting dehydrated.”

Imaya went to gather up our rabbit hunters, while Tamara and I carried the wooden boards closer to the ledge. I peered down cautiously, noting that the angry little mutant babies were no less numerous here than at the other side of the hill. I really did not want to fight those things; in a way, I was glad that Teva’ryn had taken the last of the swords from the shed. There had been only two poorly-made daggers left for me and Devi’lynn after that, which meant that I took one of them, and the other went to Imaya in case she ran out of her grand total of ten arrows. With the crappy weapon as my excuse, no one would expect me to actually fight the gnomes. Or so I hoped.

“Four rabbits!” Simon called out proudly. “We can throw two of them down as bait and keep the other two to eat.”

“They might not be safe to eat,” Pell said, holding out his rabbit carcass awkwardly. “There was some kind of strange phenomenon when we killed them. White mist burst out of them and flew into us.”

“Guys, it’s XP,” Imaya said. “I keep telling you, it’s definitely experience points! You should check out your screens!”

Simon cleared his throat. “In either case, where are the bags?”

Not counting Imaya’s quiver and the weapons, two small burlap sacks were the only items we had found in the shed. A rabbit carcass went into each of those bags, and I volunteered to carry one while Devi’lynn took the other. We got into a rough formation where Simon, Pell, and Teva’ryn took the front, Imaya and Tamara stood at the sides, with Devi’lynn and me as rearguard.

We didn’t delay the inevitable much. First the extra rabbits went over the ledge, then the guys at the front started tossing the boards down. I winced as the screeching and wailing reached almost ear-splitting highs, then jumped in alarm as a white streak of something flew at me. I tried to dodge, but it changed direction and hit me in the chest. I couldn’t even recover from my shock when another streak of white mist found me, then another, coming from the bottom of the hill. I straightened back up slowly, watching with wide eyes. I had been mistaken; the so-called XP streaks weren’t slamming into my chest, but the collar around my neck. I held a hand out in front of me, but the white mist passed through unhindered. It felt … surreal.

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“Am I actually dreaming?” I asked Devi’lynn.

The blue-skinned girl clutched her burlap sack tighter, and nodded nervously.

Alright then. I braced myself for the upcoming nightmare. The wait felt excruciating; I saw nothing but the white streaks, so my imagination ran rampant. When Simon and the others finally stopped throwing things over and jumped down the slope, I was almost grateful. Almost. One look at the gnomes with the bashed-in skulls had me instantly nauseous, but I sat down on the ledge and slid down anyway. The better I kept myself on the others’ heels, the less likely I would have to fight the monsters.

I arrived at the bottom of the slope at the same time as Devi’lynn. Teva’ryn stood nearby, covering Devi’lynn’s side by cutting down the gnomes with deadly precision. He made it look easy, fighting on uneven ground with nothing else but a short sword. By comparison Simon and Pell moved far more awkwardly, but they had their wooden shields to protect them against the teeth and claws.

Considering their tiny size and bulbous head, the little monsters were frighteningly quick about closing the distance between us. They hopped over the wooden boards and their fallen comrades with ease, and though they died just as easily, their numbers seemed to be endless. Still, the guys held them back so far—they even started to press forward. I reminded myself to get moving too, pushing off something squishy beneath my feet and falling in behind Imaya.

“I got this, I got this,” she murmured, aiming at a gnome that slipped past Pell. She loosed the arrow just as the gnome was about to jump over a fallen board, hitting the monster squarely on the forehead. She either had some prior experience with bows or just got lucky … but judging by the practiced way she nocked another arrow, it had to be the former. The white mist that erupted from the dead gnome parted seven ways, one streak slamming into each of us.

> Congratulations, your level has increased!

> Level 2 reached.

With a quick thought I willed the message to disappear, just in time to see Imaya get distracted by her own screen. She stumbled on the board at her feet and hit the ground with a tumble, the arrow in her hand snapping in two and the rest falling out of her quiver.

“Oh no, no, no,” she said, scrambling to gather her arrows. She was still on her knees when a second gnome got past Pell’s shield. It hopped over the recently-shot gnome, lunging toward Imaya. Two rows of pointed teeth glistening with saliva, the gnome opened its maw wide—only to collide with my bag head-first. My swing sent the gnome tumbling down the hill, and I reached down quickly to help Imaya back on her feet. Two other gnomes were running our way, but thankfully Simon intercepted them in time.

Little by little, the point of pressure was shifting; the worst of the horde had been cleared from ahead of us, and the monsters were now coming from the sides. Teva’ryn took one of our flanks while Pell and Simon covered the other, leaving Tamara at the front. She shouted something back to us, but I couldn’t hear her over the constant wail of the monsters. Imaya went after her quickly, her face pale and hands shaking, having given up on shooting her remaining arrows. I wasn’t sure how to feel about that, but everything was happening so quickly that I barely had the time to feel sure about anything.

I glanced back at Devi’lynn just to see her play tug of war with one of the gnomes that had latched onto her bag. Teva’ryn had his hands full with the tide of gnomes coming from the side, so he wasn’t able to help her. Cursing under my breath, I hopped, stumbled, and tripped over the fallen bodies to reach the Sylven girl, trying not to think about what I was going to do. Clutching my dagger tightly, I tackled the gnome biting into Devi’lynn’s bag and jammed the weapon into its bulbous head. I let go of my weapon immediately after, shocked by the twitching body under my hand, sickened by the amount of blood, and horrified by the wet gurgling sound the gnome let out as it died.

With my attention on the dead body, I noticed the other gnome too late as it came at me from behind. This time it was Devi’lynn’s well-timed swing that sent the gnome flying, making me snap out of my trance. The creatures were closing in from every direction now, separating me and my Sylven companions from the rest of our group. Teva’ryn was fending them off bravely, but he couldn’t be everywhere at once. If we didn’t act now, we’d become surrounded.

“Teva’ryn!” I yelled, hoping that he understood the universal language of running away. I grabbed Devi’lynn by the arm and pulled her after me, straight toward the gnomes in front of us. Reaching into my bag, I drew my final weapon; tonight’s dinner. I chucked the rabbit carcass into the throng of gnomes and as they hungrily snapped at it, I jumped over the little monsters. Well, I would have jumped over them, if only I was a little bit more athletic. My boot connected with the closest gnome’s face mid-jump and I lost my balance, falling to the ground and taking another gnome’s with me. I tumbled down the slope, unable to slow my descent—and frankly, too scared to even try. I just hoped that Teva’ryn and Devi’lynn got through the gnomes in my wake.

A feminine blue hand appeared in my vision when I stopped rolling, gripping my arm firmly and helping me to my feet. I winced as my bruised knees and elbows protested against the motion, but forced myself to start running on Devi’lynn’s side. Teva’ryn was only a few steps behind, swinging his blood-soaked sword at the screeching creatures tailing us. Thankfully, we were the ones with the longer legs. The run down the hill was relatively easy; the adrenaline made up for the fact that I hadn’t run this much in years. The three of us put the hill behind us quickly, jogging to the river to catch up to the rest of the team. As soon as we did, my collar projected yet another message in front of me.

> Quest completed: Fresh start, fresh little bodies

> +1 Feat

>

> Congratulations, your legend has risen!

> Legend 1 reached.