The Elders command was the spark that shot us all toward the base of the mountain. As I ran, shoulder to shoulder with the rest, I wasn’t sure if we were allowed to fight each other before starting the ascent. Glancing to my left, it didn’t seem as if Emsi had any plans to use her bladed knuckles on me. Instead, with her shorter legs, she seemed entirely focused on keeping pace, as she was already a full stride behind.

Out of those near me, Tamra was the first to reach the construct. She had angled to the right on her approach, so that her first steps were on a section that sloped gently upward. This let her keep her speed unlike others who were reaching less forgiving parts of the mountain with tall steps that needed to be crawled up or sheer faces that needed to be climbed. Of course, an easy path was popular and Aldric and I reached it at the same time as Leeks, also from our Hall. Aldric didn’t hesitate, punching at the other boy with a crystal encrusted fist. Leeks hadn’t been expecting it, and the blow seemed to rip half the skin from his face, cheek to nose to eyebrow.

He screamed, stumbling, and despite the Healer Elder’s words, Aldric didn’t slow to finish the job. Instead, he called out, “Sorry!” and kept right on running. I hesitated a moment near where Leeks had fallen to one knee. From the push-up contest, I knew he had the Greater Constitution Mastery, but as I had feared, it didn’t seem to be helping him in this situation.

Shouts behind me turned my head to see that many of the Neophytes had started in on each other as well. Chikra’s spear whipped side-to-side, slicing and stabbing, while tall Gimit looked to have crushed the chest of one Healer girl with a large rock and was lining up another throw, those nearby scrambling to try and get away. A few were circling wide of those skirmishes but still heading toward me, so I spun around, pounding up the gradual incline as fast as I could, wishing that Boast had been giving out masteries of speed last night.

After two sharp turns, I soon discovered that this path went from easy to challenging in a heartbeat, the next section of the mountain was a nearly vertical climb. Because of this, neither Tamra nor Aldric had made much progress toward the top in my brief absence. She was three full body lengths up to Aldric’s one and must have heard me, because no sooner had I found my first grip than she called down, “What do you two think you’re doing?”

“Don’t play hard to get,” Aldirc shouted from above me. “We’re in this together.”

“If you don’t slow me down,” she called back with a laugh.

The footing here was similar to the wall we’d faced in the Thresher, but with my new mantle I didn’t find myself straining to use the spaced hand- and foot-holds as much as before. Sounds of other Neophytes below and the fear of having a rock thrown at me from behind, encouraged me to use my mastery for the first time. While I wished to protect my entire backside, I didn’t dare tense my arms and legs because I needed them to climb. So, I focused on stiffening my scalp to hopefully avoid a head wound, as well as tensing my back muscles and the skin above them. Immediately, I learned that even that little was too much, my shoulders locking up. With effort, I restricted the toughness to just the middle of my back down to my buttocks and that seemed to work. Though, with my spine stiffened, my movements became awkward, slowing my ascent. I was, however, a better climber than Aldric, and so I managed to catch up to him nonetheless. Reaching the top hadn’t taken too long, since it was only a small section of the larger mountain we climbed, and when we did, we found Tamra there waiting for us, her sword drawn.

I was going to thank her, but then I saw that she was actually facing off against the twins, Oph and Orm in their green tunics. They must have taken a side path that didn’t involve climbing and so let them reach this place even faster. Tamra made a feint toward one, but then, quick as could be, changed directions, slashing her blade across Oph’s belly. The girl twin gasped, grabbing her midsection, and in that moment of surprise, Tamra shot between them, knocking the Oph over as she did.

She really did mean for us to keep chasing after her.

Aldric had found his footing by now and followed Tamra with a shout, shoving into Orm with his shoulder. The remaining twin was spun around by the charge, and when he righted himself, he threw his stick after but it fell well short of Aldric.

“Glad to see you ended up with your sister,” I said, walking up beside him. Orm hadn’t been particularly helpful in the Thresher, but he had still been one of our companions and deserved a moment to catch himself, particularly after losing his partner and throwing away his weapon.

Orm eyed me and then jerked his head in the direction that Tamra and Aldric had gone. “Same for you and yours.”

“Than–” I started, but his hand whipped forward, catching me in the jaw before I was ready to toughen my skin. I barely felt it though, like something had struck me to be sure, but there was very little pain. He looked at me oddly, clearly noticing my lack of reaction, and I did the same back. Did his Beast Kin Mantle not give him some sort of feral strength? Risahned, the Beast Kin Devout, had certainly possessed something along those lines in order to hurt Aphos as she had.

He went to punch again, but I straight jabbed him in the face. Unlike his ineffectual attack, my fist crumpled his nose.

“Gah,” he cried, lifting his hands to try and hold back the blood spurting from his face.

I had broken noses before but never this easily. Had the Warrior’s Mantle changed me so much? While I was curious, the question was only a small buzz in the back of my mind. Too many practice and real matches in the Crim had drilled into my body how to follow up an attack that had connected, so it was mostly by reflex that I sunk a punch into his stomach that doubled him over. From that position, it was very easy to strike him on the side of the head – a blow that took him to the ground, landing near the hands of someone who had almost finished the same climb I had.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“No hard feelings, I hope,” I said, lifting my foot to stomp Orm into unconsciousness or worse. However, I hesitated, and then pushed him on the shoulder instead, rolling his body over the side of the small cliff and into the climber. The hands vanished, and a cry of surprise fell away from me, making the move a good one. Inside though, I cursed myself for not heeding the Healer Elder’s words. I hadn’t pushed Orm’s body out of strategy but because I had hesitated to kill, even if it was temporary, someone I had grown up with. Obviously, I couldn’t keep going in this way and win the Melee.

I would just have to do better against my next opponent.

Sprinting past Oph’s body and up the path beside me, I soon became worried that I wouldn’t have the chance, Tamra and Aldric seeming so far ahead now. It was then I realized that even if someone had already reached the summit, which I was barely a third of the way toward, they would have to hold the position for the length of time it took the wall flame to burn down, and it had yet to ignite.

I still had time.

The magic-made edifice was as much maze as mountain, so as I ran around one part of it, I could see those below me on other paths, and the same for some above. I spotted Iles down and to the right, using her bent stick to block a punch from Deq, a Warrior who I knew had Greater Strength. She stumbled back from the hit, but her stick held, which seemed impossible to me. That was until I saw Bask swipe an oblong rock I knew had previously been smoothly against Deq’s side, cutting him. A sharpened rock and a strengthened stick? One answer presented itself and that was that Iles and Bask, who were both Artisans, had managed to modify their chosen tools, either with their mantle or a mastery. Deq’s reaction to the attack was to swing a backhand at Bask, which spun the poor lad’s head fully around, his neck more than broken.

“By the Saints,” I gasped, though my steps didn’t slow. Watching a demon kill us so brutally was one thing, but each other? Also, seeing Deq’s mastery on display was a poignant reminder that though I might be stronger than someone like Orm, there were others here who could easily best me in such a contest.

Iles, however, used the opportunity to run her stick through Deq’s throat. He lashed out at her, like he had with Bask, but she leapt outside his reach. I didn’t get to see him fall, the path I was on turning inward, but I was sure he must be dead, his strength not saving him. We were all like that, incomplete, but each step in our training would bring us closer to who and what we were meant to be, I was sure.

Rounding the bend, I came to a depression of sorts, perhaps five meters across, where I found Aldric and Tamra fighting against two Neophytes in black. One was Celeste, who was of course facing off against Tamra, managing to stay just outside the flashing blade with more precision of movement than I was used to seeing from her. It was obviously a newly acquired ability, and I couldn’t help but be impressed that she was managing to use it so effectively already. The other was Jivnu, a pleasant but normally quiet boy who was moving much too fast. As I watched, he snaked around a wild punch Aldric threw, landing two of his own in the space it had taken Aldric to perform just the one. This was clearly not the first hits that Aldric had taken because his face was bruised, and his body was hunched.

“I’m here!” I cried, but that had been a mistake. Without warning, Jivnu shifted and then shot toward me, quicker than I’d ever seen anyone run. I blinked and he was nearly on top of me, my entire body tensing in panic. My mind froze too, but then, in a split-second decision, I realized I could use this to my advantage. I expanded my tension from my muscles to my skin everywhere, toughening my whole body, or at least as much of it as I could.

Jivnu slammed a fist into my cheek, another into my ribs, and then into my stomach. Even at the speed he was moving, he did it with more skill than Orm had, his front two knuckles leading each strike. But still, with my Toughened Skin activated, the punches felt like hard taps, nothing dangerous.

Jivnu connected six more times before he started frowning, his fists slowing some as he did. And standing there, stiff as a board, I was able to see it all. I had a tendency to beat people after losing to them, because I watched closely how they fought and made changes in response. Jivnu’s speed was amazing, but like the rest of us, he’d only had his abilities for a few hours and so he hadn’t come up with more than a basic pattern for his strikes, all of them targeted on my face or torso.

Realizing that, it seemed a simple thing to loosen one arm and punch him when he leaned in for his own attacks. Part of me worried that he might be able to use his speed to dodge out of the way, but I also thought that moving his arms so quickly was probably taking most of his concentration. Either I was right, or he wasn’t expecting me to fight back after how still I had been, because my fist connected solidly with the bump of his throat.

He staggered backward coughing, and now it was my turn to land more than one hit. I unstiffened the rest of my body and struck him in the jaw twice, hard as I could. The second laid him out on the ground, stiller than sleep. I didn’t think he was feigning, so I moved to support Tamra.

Celeste saw me coming right away and grimaced. She stepped out of the way of another of Tamra’s sword strokes, and then Tamra howled in pain, from no wound I could see. She looked down of all places, and it seemed to me like she was trying to move her legs but couldn’t.

“Guess we’ll have to end this early,” Celeste hissed, a small piece of sharpened stick appearing in her hand. Tamra twisted, and I put on a final burst of speed, but I could tell we were both too late.

Aldric bowled into Celeste, knocking her to the side. Whatever power the Assassin Neophyte had used on Tamra was undone just as quickly, because she moved to follow. I did the same, but then Aldric fell backward, Tamra catching him. Celeste sprinted away.

I didn’t care about chasing her, so I turned to my siblings, and stopped breathing; Celeste’s stick had ended up in Aldric’s eye, only a bit of it protruding, meaning the rest was in his head.

“I really do hate that bitch,” he said, blood flowing down his face and getting into his mouth.

Tamra slowly lowered him to the ground, while I did a quick check around us. Jivnu still hadn’t moved, and no one else seemed to be coming this way yet. I would have thought us lucky if our brother hadn’t been dying at our feet.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Tamra admonished him, her jaw bunched.

“That means thank you,” I said, kneeling beside the pair.

“Know that,” Aldric said and then his one good eye swung toward Tamra. “Told you, we’re in this toge--” His body seized, shaking wildly for the space of two heartbeats and then he was still. The unfinished word never left his throat, and the space it left behind it seemed much too empty.