As he tumbled through the air, he tried to use his core to force his body around into a more stable platform but failed. If the searing pain in his lower back was anything to consider, then the damage was fairly extensive, as his legs no longer worked.
Using Many Forms Mirage, he conjured a parachute attached to a pack that grew out to surround him. This yanked him up hard, causing him to hiss through clenched teeth as his descent into darkness slowed. He had stopped spiralling through the air like a rag doll and managed to look up to the lip where he had fallen from to see the archer aiming a shot at him.
Without hesitation, he let his chute dissipate and dropped in time to hear the twang of a bow and the woosh of an arrow fly overhead. Conjuring with his skill again, he formed a glider and was already in the nose-down position as he picked up speed.
There!
Frantically looking around, he spotted a small ledge that was pretty low down and under where his attackers stood, so he aimed for that and sped over towards it.
Another arrow whizzed past somewhere, and he clenched his teeth hard as pain and anxiousness threatened to overwhelm him.
The outcropping wasn't far now, and he pulled up, levelling out to come in for a sudden landing as his useless legs that hung limply under him moved back up and behind him at the sharp change in speed.
Just as he arrived at the rocky shelf, an arrow found its mark, slamming through the glider and causing the Mirage to vanish.
He fell the last couple of metres to the area under him, the air being knocked from his lungs as his momentum caused his face and body to drag across the sharp landscape.
*Crash*
A small explosion of force washed over him from his rear as dust got kicked into the air. Turning to look, he saw his right foot was now a mangled, bloody stump, but it didn't appear to have been caused by the attack just now as that landed further back. He suspected it had happened when the glider was destroyed, but as he couldn't feel pain there, he wasn't sure.
Knowing he couldn't stay there, he dragged himself forward, leaving a trail of blood behind him like a vampiric slug.
There looked to be a large nest sitting into the ravine's wall nearby, so he headed towards it, hoping the owner wasn't around.
Another blast came from behind, but it landed close to the edge of the small area of sanctuary he had found again.
Looking up as he went, he saw an overhanging section of the rocky wall blocking his view from above slightly, making him realise his pursuers couldn't see him now. He stopped momentarily to catch his breath and calm his taught nerves as he applied self-aid.
Stopping further blood loss was his main priority, so he worked on his leg, but it was made more problematic due to not being able to hold himself up in the sitting position without using both arms. Panic threatened to rise, but he blocked it out by being laser-focused on the task.
It didn't take long for him to apply a homemade tourniquet he had kept in a dedicated medical pouch, using bandages and ointment on all the other cuts and grazes that littered his body. He had kept such an emergency supply since the day his arm had been cut off.
Reaching around to his lower back, his hand came away soaked in blood, but he tried to remain calm and steady his breathing to slow his heart in an attempt to do anything to stem the blood loss.
Applying ointment to a large bandage, he placed it on the ground face up and rolled onto it, fastening it tight at the front. It kept pressure on the wound at his back, and it was the best he could do for now.
He was in pretty rough shape and wanted nothing but sleep, but he knew that was a terrible idea. As he lay there for a moment, focusing on the now and staying conscious, a slight splattering of water started to fall all around him, and he thought it was starting to rain.
It wasn't until a shout came from above that he realised what it was.
"Have a drink on us, you little shit."
Powered by anger at the disrespect of the thugs above, he painstakingly dragged himself towards the nest and out of the falling yellow shower. His inner revenge demon was working overtime at the slight, and this was one time he agreed with its desire to seek retribution.
As he reached the nest, he pulled himself up, ignoring the pain and peered into it, spotting an extensive collection of bones but no recent blood or flesh. Whatever creature had made this was long gone if the surrounding settled dust was any indication, and he slumped back, relieved.
He propped himself up against the outside of the rough wooden structure and lay there, using his seething rage as fuel to remain conscious. Now, it was a fight against slumber, and he used this time to plan how to get out of the ravine when he Rejuvenated.
Taking stock of his gear, he was relieved to find all his daggers still there, and he removed the two magical-looking Talismans and noticed they were undamaged.
The obvious solution to his problem was to use the cover of darkness to climb out of there and slip away back to the village. His parents and others would come out looking for him when he didn't return, and he doubted the hunters would miss the obvious trail left in the wake of the earlier combat.
This would give him a way out, but he wasn't sure he wanted to do that. The part of him that felt mad at the attempt on his life burned for revenge, and that instinct was like an ever-present devil sitting on his shoulder whispering guidance. It wanted him to destroy those above who had come for his life, and he felt there might be a way.
Thinking back on his attackers, he replayed the chase, singling out what he could have done better and using it as a chance to grow, but also focusing on some interesting points.
The first was the admission by the group. They had been unable to track him, even though somehow they knew he was in the area. This meant they didn't have skills geared towards tracking and observing.
This gave him a chance to use darkness as an ally. They might have had a skill that better suited finding things in the dark, but he knew things like that were rare. Weighing up the probabilities, he felt they wouldn't have such a skill, but it was a risk he factored into his plans.
The second was that only the man with the shifting metal plates had shown the ability to use essence to enhance his body. If he could catch them unaware, the greatsword user would be his first target. An idea began to form in his head about how he could use those same defensive plates to bring the tall man down.
His strategy was risky, relying heavily on stealth and surprise, but it didn't appear stupid. With a rough plan in mind, he began to tidy it up, accounting for different outcomes and making sure he was ready for this.
Hiding and letting the villagers save him was the obvious choice, but he wouldn't become anyone strong that way. When he left to travel the world, there wouldn't be anyone to save him, and it wasn't a given that all his future fights would be fair.
Chances are that being outnumbered and outclassed would happen to him again, and he needed to learn how to deal with it. This would be the first step in that, and he considered it another type of dangerous training. It was risky and probably a little stupid, but then so was any fight.
Checking his core, he waited in painful anticipation.
-----
His Rejuvenation activated whilst it was still light, causing him to sigh in relief at the vanishing pain.
Standing up, he checked his core and found it had regressed again, but he hadn't dropped a minor realm, much to his relief.
Removing the bandages, he packed them away to clean at a later date and did a once-over, ensuring he was back in fighting shape. Nodding to himself, he looked around, not finding anything of interest, so he jumped into the nest.
Rooting around, it was mostly an assortment of old bones and dust that caused him to cough, so he formed a black bandanna across his face with his skill to keep it out.
He was about to give up and focus on cultivating to pass the time when a metal gleam caught his eye. Digging through the collection of old bones, he cleared them away and found what looked like a skeletal human hand wearing a fancy golden ring.
Clearing more bones out around the hand, he eventually uncovered the battered remains of a battered human torso. There was no skull to be seen anywhere nearby, but it was unmistakably human.
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The rib cage was covered by some brown leather armour in sections, but it had been torn to pieces, and the front of both were split open. Removing a dagger, he pushed it against the leather and found he couldn't penetrate it, even when he used everything.
Whoever this skeleton belonged to wasn't a weakling based on the quality of their gear, and he nervously glanced around, praying that whatever had created this nest was indeed long gone.
Bending down, he squatted and took a closer look at the ring, turning the skeletal hand this way and that. It was a little surreal for him to be messing with a dead person like this, but right now, he needed whatever help he could get. So if there were something here he could use, then he would have to take it.
Slipping the ring off the bony finger, he glanced at the underside and confirmed his suspicions. The ring was a spatial storage object like the ones he had seen some villagers use.
Marcus had let him mess around with his for a short time previously, so he had a rough idea of how to use them, sending his will into the ring. A sensation of connection crossed over him as he understood what was stored inside.
There were various objects, and closing his eyes to focus, he felt images of the ample space inside appear before him. As he looked around, instability washed over him from the space inside the ring, and he immediately knew what it meant. The ring was damaged, and the pocket of space used for storage was failing.
He tried to take a fancy-looking sword out but failed, causing him to sigh. As he was about to return it to the skeleton, an idea struck him. Activating his core, he channelled spatial essence into the ring and was delighted to find the fraying edges of the internal space stabilise slightly.
Preparing to pat himself on the back mentally, he suddenly realised that all the space essence inside his core was quickly being sucked away. Stopping the flow, he watched as the storage area inside the ring started to fail even faster than before, causing him to panic.
Using his core again, he sent spatial essence back into it, stabilising it once more and using his will to try and empty everything. This activation of the ring's function caused a chain reaction that cut off his essence supply and his ability to connect with the internal space.
A book abruptly expanded rapidly into existence from the ring, flopping onto a pile of bones nearby as an electric shock ran up his arm from the storage device. Turning it over, he spotted the black inscriptions and sighed. It had failed, and whatever was inside was now gone, destroyed by the collapsing space.
Picking up the only item that he had managed to save, he flipped through it quickly and found that it was a skill he was unable to use. It was an area of effect slowing ability called 'Gravity Lashing', but it was for a cultivator with dual metal and Earth essence affinities. The skills application was interesting to study, and at worst, it was something to sell, so he wasn't too disheartened, but it wasn't anything of use for now.
Looking over at the skeleton, he replaced the ring and quickly piled the bones together in respect, finding a skull to the rear of the nest that he placed with the rest.
He had profited slightly from the cultivator and felt if he had a chance in the future, he would come back and perform a proper burial, but it wasn't something to worry about now.
Sitting down, he tucked the book away safely, cultivating and slowly restoring his spatial essence, waiting for darkness to come.
Standing up after some time, he watched the lights flicker across the sky that heralded in the coming darkness.
Knowing this was his chance, he slowly edged out, looking upwards to where the men were last and saw no silhouetted figures waiting for him. Letting out a relieved breath, he turned and moved towards the rock wall nearby and thudded it hard a few times with a dagger.
After making sure the noise wasn't alerting the men above who might be waiting for him, he conjured a rope, attached it to a black dagger and drove it into the wall.
Like this, he started to move sideways across the rocky face and away from the ledge. The light above faded after a time, encasing him in pure darkness, and he felt a suffocating sense of apprehension as he climbed.
It took him hours as he methodically moved across and up, causing his arms to ache. He didn't want to come out at the location he went in, remembering how using the same path had got him into this mess. He hoped that using that as a lesson would get him out of it.
After a long while of driving daggers in, moving others and ensuring at least two always held his weight, he reached a zone of near dark, letting him know he was close to the top.
Taking his time to be even more cautious, he climbed up and rested slightly under the rim where he could pull himself back onto the ground. Peeking up for a swift glance but spotting nothing.
Hanging there, he cultivated to recharge his core for a time as it had depleted from the many conjured ropes during his climb, getting his core to a state he was happy with. He was about to ascend when a small, dark shape flew through the ravine behind him.
He froze in place and didn't dare to breathe as the noise of beating wings grew louder then more faint as whatever it was faded into the distance.
His heart was thundering in his chest, and he took a moment to calm down before pulling himself up, having another peek and then continuing over and back onto solid ground, making sure to collect his daggers.
Not moving for a few minutes, he lay prone and surveyed the dark landscape, spotting nothing out of the obvious. Preparing to move, a flicker of motion came from the line of trees a couple hundred metres down, causing him to still. Staying motionless, he intently looked in that direction and spotted a dark outline of a person swatting at a glowing insect, causing him to narrow his eyes.
He had half expected the hitmen to have left and found somewhere safe to ride out the night. If that were the case, he would track them down in the dark and ambush them, but seeing as they were still here, it saved him the trouble.
Scooping some dirt off the ground, he let it warm in his hands before rubbing it over them, darkening his skin, and doing the same with his face. Afterwards, he conjured a plain black mask and his best impression of a ghillie suit before unhurriedly crawling across the ground.
His progress was agonisingly slow, and it took him a long while to reach the line of trees in front of him as he moved so gradually, it felt like time had slowed to a crawl, but he didn't appear to alert the trio waiting for him.
Hitting the treeline, he kept to his deliberate, methodical way of moving, using everything he had learnt when hunting to stay undetected.
Once deeper inside the woodland area, he silently rose to his feet, practically hugging a tree as faint footsteps from something moving nearby caused him to freeze.
Waiting out whatever creature was strolling by, he pushed the daggers into the trunk of a tree and used them to pull himself upwards, ending up amongst its branches.
Using the interlocking thick branches, he made his best impression of a monkey as he swung, shimmied and dangled, getting him quietly towards the location of his enemies.
It had been hours already since he set out, and his arms were burning at the effort even with the greater endurance his cultivation provided, but he refused to stop.
Finally, after what felt to him like another hour, he arrived above the location of the men and was now leaning against a thick tree trunk slightly above and behind the group.
He spotted the greatsword user to the left of the three and the archer on the right, leaving the man with an axe in the middle. They were all led prone close together, using a small clump of tall grass to hide them, but it didn't cover them from above.
"Why are we even waiting for him? Even if he didn't bleed out, there's no way he'll be able to climb out of that hole." One of the men whispered. The voice carried over the steady wind and up to him.
"The guild needs proof of death, you know that. We already fucked up that last mission. If we mess this up, we'll be done for, and they won't let us walk away." Another replied.
He wasn't sure what this 'guild' was they referred to, but he suspected it was some organisation that traded kills for coin.
That didn't matter at the moment, and he unhurriedly opened his pouch and took out the two Talisman, taking one in each hand. The runic diagrams on them slightly glowed, so he kept them close and covered.
He didn't bother with any internal pep talks or self-motivation this time, as cold calculation took over.
Activating the inscriptions, a burst of flame jutted out from the one in his left hand and sprayed all over the back of the man with the greatsword. He was the most severe threat and deserving of his most potent Talisman.
Activating the Talisman in his right at the same time, the icicle spears shot down to the ground and impaled the axe user from arse to head. When using this one, he did it in such a way that most of the spears landed on that man, hoping a couple would hit the archer who tucked in close to him.
The ranged attacker was more alert than the other two as he instantly rolled to the side, only one of the spears catching him in the shoulder as he moved.
Not letting the element of surprise go to waste, he jumped down from his hiding place, conjuring some flying insects and sending them to sting the man's eyes.
The greatsword wielder was also on his feet now and screaming, part in pain and also anger and spotted him landing close by. The smell of charring flesh and light from the flaming man filtered into the surroundings, giving the area a surreal feeling.
The burning man had activated the metal rotating plates in apparent panic at the attack, and they hovered around him protectively. This result caused him to smile, realising he had predicted correctly.
As the tall man closed the short distance, his sword held ready to strike the burst function of the Talisman activated. The eruption hit the inside of the shifting metal that hovered above the flames, returning most of the explosive power inwards.
The roaring man was suddenly like a mangled puppet with his strings cut as he dropped his greatsword and fell forward.
Stepping to the left, he watched the falling man and kicked out, launching the dead man at his friend, causing the bowman to stagger at the unexpected mangled flaming mass flying towards him.
A glance at the impaled axe user made it obvious he was dead, so refusing to let the one remaining enemy get his bearings, he charged forward, conjuring a twinblade and swinging it down in a diagonal strike, hoping to decapitate the man.
Instead of moving his entire body, the archer bent to the side, feet still, avoiding the attack with serpent-like grace and returning one of his own with the metal bow he now realised held tiny sharp wings at either end.
He gritted his teeth at the slash that caught him in the shoulder, slightly distancing himself, and began a clash of weapons, with his twinblade slightly winning out in range.
The man was far more skilled than expected at close-in fighting, and even though it had only been a dozen blows, sweat-soaked the back of his top at the number of times those sharp edges had nearly found his neck.
Part of him had been expecting some kind of angry monologuing from the man for killing his friends, but the reality was different. The pair were locked in a life-and-death struggle, and neither had the time for anything but action and reaction. It was a no-frills dance of death.
After another dozen lightning-fast blows, it became evident that his opponent was slightly better than he was, and if this fight kept up, he knew it would end up with him dying.
Making a desperate gamble during another exchange, he overextended and let the bow catch him with the razor-sharp attachment, feeling it sink directly into his side and sticking on a rib. He anticipated the pain and didn't let it stop him from taking advantage of the opening created by doing such a seemingly stupid thing.
He let go of the twin blade and conjured a dagger as his fist was already lunging towards the neck of a shocked man and sinking straight into his throat, opening it up.
Warm blood squirted out across his face, with some entering his mouth, but he was too caught up in the moment to care. He spotted the look of confused realisation in the man's bulging eyes as he dropped the bow and gripped his neck, falling to his knees.
They remained like that for several moments, the man holding his throat and bleeding out, with him watching as blood ran down his own face. The sense of hatred and anger for these men fizzled out at seeing the look of pleading desperation in the guy's final moments. Feeling a sense of pity at the misery he had created, he removed a dagger and ended it in one final blow.
Panting hard, he bent over and held his side, seeing that it was a deep wound, but thankfully, the small blade was more for cutting and hadn't gone in too deep.
Staggering over to a tree, he put his back to it and slid down, the built-up tension deflating as he dropped, letting his camouflage dissipate as he did.
Performing self-aid yet again for the umpteenth time today, he couldn't help but smile a little as his shaky hands held the last ointment-filled bandage. It was too small to wrap around him, so all he could do was hold it in place, but that didn't matter as he grinned. He had won.
*Clap. Clap. Clap.*
"A good fight, not at all the outcome I was expecting. You have real talent for a kid your age." The well-spoken voice of a man rang out from above.
This sudden interruption to his thoughts caused dread to knot his insides as he looked up to see a well-groomed man dressed all in black sitting on a branch nearby, one leg crossed over the other.
The man smiled at him, displaying a set of perfect white teeth that reflected orange light from the burning corpse nearby.