I made a beeline straight for the weapons cache while the others occupied the mercenaries.

Sadly, though, our enemies weren’t quite on board with this plan. One of them—a tall woman who I’d expected from her solid build to be a barbarian—pushed herself into my way, and activated a warding spell. I bounced off the shimmering blue bubble into the air, though not high enough that I had time to open a portal before crashing into the sand.

I tumbled head over heels once before whipping a leg out to steady myself, and then I charged towards the woman who’d attacked me as the rest of the gang dealt with enemies of their own.

The woman raised her hands to prepare another ward, but I knew what was coming, this time. As I closed the gap on the mage, I opened a portal in front of me and blinked through it, appearing behind the enemy before she knew I was there. There, I took a leaf from Lore’s book, bringing the butt of my knife down into the back of the woman’s head—to render her unconscious, not kill her. With both my Stealth Attack and Execution abilities, I did enough to drop the woman to the sand in only one hit.

Lightwarder defeated!

Worldbending — +1,050xp

Knifework — +1,300xp

Stealth — +750xp

But there were others still to deal with.

I whipped my head around, searching for who to attack next. Lambkin, who was most effective at range, was rapidly being encroached upon by a man wielding two swords. Before long, he would be in trouble.

I opened a portal beneath my feet and dropped through it without looking, appearing in the air above the dual-wielding enemy. As I fell, I activated the very same abilities that would boost my damage, and slammed the butt of the knife into the man’s head. Again, they fell in one hit—though in part that was because this enemy already had some tactically placed arrows in him, each of them coated in poisons of drowsiness.

The Blade of Urcat defeated!

Worldbending — +1,900xp

Worldbending increased to level 56!

Base Points gained — +2 INT, +2 Free Points (INT/WIS/CHA)

Knifework — +1,450xp

Knifework increased to level 41!

Base Points Gained — +1 DEX, +1 STR, +2 Free Points (VIT/DEX/STR)

Stealth — +700xp

‘Just like that?’ Lambkin asked.

‘Just like that.’

‘You’re stronger than your level suggests.’

I cast my eyes around the battleground as I replied to him. ‘That’s what an efficient build will do. How many level 19 people do you know with a level 55 skill?’ Spotting two enemies approaching Ama, I left Lambkin without hearing his reply, once again falling through a portal to arrive behind one of the enemies.

I once again arced my blade through the air to knock the enemy out, but even with my Gentle Step passive, they noticed me joining the fray. The enemy twisted to block my attack with their forearm, and though I still caught them with my attack, it was only a glancing blow. They were about to launch some spell at me with their other hand when Ama attacked.

The mage lifted her hand, pulling forth thousands of grains of iron from the sand around us. These grains came together in an arrowhead-like shape, melting into one solid object, and then with the flick of Ama’s hand, launched at the enemy with enough power to—

‘Ama no!’ I had just enough time to shout, realising what she intended to do, before this metal object shot towards the enemy, slicing through the side of their neck. Blood sprayed over me, covering my face and torso, and the enemy fell to the ground, clutching their neck.

Firespouter defeated!

Worldbending — +900xp

Knifework — +950xp

While the next nearest mercenary blinked on at their colleague in terror, I shouted to Ama, ‘This isn’t what we decided!’

The metal mage shrugged. ‘An accident. It happens.’

‘That was not a bloody—’ I started, but we’d have to finish up this argument later because the other enemy had recovered and was charging Ama.

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The metal mage stretched both hands towards where her crafted object had shot into the sand, trying to wrench it back out. Before she could succeed, I made a split-second decision. I portalled myself to her side, activating the same damage-boosting abilities as before, and I brought the butt of my blade down into the back of her head. It didn’t fell her in one, but fortunately she was so caught aback by this that she didn’t immediately react, and I had the chance to do it again. The mercenary hit her with a frost attack to the side of the head, unsteadying her, and when my blade once more bashed into her skull, she became unconscious.

Metal Mage of The Trio defeated!

Worldbending — +650xp

Knifework — +950xp

The mercenary was on me before I had a moment to regather myself, so I opened a portal beneath me that I fell through… but the enemy did too. We tumbled out onto a dune not so far away, and I was first to steady myself once more. I pounced the enemy, knowing that there was no chance of breaking line of sight, and so instead of relying on the Stealth abilities, I tried something else. I held my dagger with the blade facing me, and I activated Knifestorm. As I spun, blade in hand, I hit the enemy again and again and again in the side of his temple. Somewhere in that—I’ll admit I don’t know when—I knocked them out.

Frostcaster defeated!

Worldbending — +250xp

Knifework — +1,950xp

I stagged back up to my feet, and saw someone charging at me. I was ready to attack them, about to open another portal at my feet, when I realised that the person charging was… Carle.

‘Styk, what are you doing?’ Lore shouted as he finished off the mercenary he’d been battling with.

‘She killed one of them!’ I cried. ‘That wasn’t what we agreed!’

‘Ah,’ Lore said.

‘And so you—’ Carle started.

‘I just knocked her out! She’ll be fine! We’ll get one of Corminar’s healing potions in her, and she’ll be right as—’

Nobody had interrupted me, but I’d seen something over the big man’s shoulder. The mercenaries who had chased Raelas away were returning. Fast.

Carle followed my eyeline, and his eyes narrowed. ‘We will have to talk about this later,’ he told me, before turning to do battle once more.

We were again outnumbered, having not quite dealt with all eight of the mercenaries who remained. With all seven of the others coming back—I hoped this didn’t mean something had happened to Raelas—we were outnumbered more than we’d been initially, even.

But we didn’t need to take them all down; that wasn’t why we were here.

‘Occupy them!’ I shouted to the team at large while I opened yet another portal to fall through, this time stepping out next to the storage tent. I kept low as I creeped inside, managing to avoid being spotted by the mercenaries returning to find their camp under attack, and I looked around.

Lambkin hadn’t been kidding.

Inside was crate upon crate upon crate, and from what I could tell, more of them were filled with swords, axes, armour… even a couple of spellbooks which were good for one-off spell uses. They were all very neatly packaged in crates too big to fit through a portal, so it was a shame that I now had to tip everything onto the ground.

Bracers and chest plates and swords and shields all went crashing onto the ground—or, at least, they would have crashed if I hadn’t cast a spell of Silence to hide what was going on. Only when I was done did I poke my head outside the tent.

The rest of the team were all grouped together, still standing—well, except for Ama, who was currently draped over Carle’s shoulder—but losing seemed to be a case of “when” rather than “if”. So it was probably a good thing that I was ready to go.

I reached my arm out of the tent, pointing one behind the team and the other far in the distance. I opened a portal at each location, the one far away a little higher above the ground than I’d intended, but it was hard to aim perfectly at that distance. ‘Run!’ I shouted, and the team did as instructed without hesitation. I didn’t quite know how I felt about that; from their point of view, they were leaving me alone in a camp with ten enemies, but I suppose they knew that I could quickly get away with portals myself.

When the last of my friends and acquaintances were through the portal, I closed it, and prepared another one under the pile of weapons and armour at my feet. This time, I used a Saved Portal, and I fell back into Coldharbour’s central plaza amongst a pile of stolen goods.

Step one was complete.

"Styk"

Level 19 Bladespinner

Base Stats:

Vitality — 50

Intelligence — 208

Dexterity — 125

Strength — 78

Wisdom — 74

Charisma — 49

Skills:

Worldbending — Level 56

Knifework — Level 41

Stealth — Level 25

Identification — Level 18

Needlework — Level 18

Abilities:

Stab III — Put your weight behind your wielded blade and force the tip through tougher hides and armour. Damage scales on [STR], increased by an additional 50%.

Execution III — Attack a target while undetected for +300% damage.

Closed Reach — Bend reality to narrow the gap between blade and target by up to 8 inches. Uses mana.

Mana-Fuelled — Passive. Optionally, use mana in place of stamina to activate Knifework abilities.

Knifestorm — Lash out at all surrounding enemies in a tornado of blades, using either one or two daggers. All enemies with arm’s reach receive physical damage worth weapon’s base damage and additional damage scaling on [STR].

Enhanced Portals — Create a portal to another location within current range of sight or within a thirty yard radius. Support up to two pairs of portals at once. Uses mana to open portals only.

Portal Slice — Passive. Portals can now be spawned within non-sentient objects. Doing so slices through all objects that are not reinforced by magic.

Tamed Portals — Passive. Increased efficiency of portal magicks means that your portal glow is reduced by 50%, making them less likely to be detected by enemies.

Ash Husk — Convert your flesh to ash, strengthening it against flame for ten minutes. Gain 50% resistance to fire attacks.

Shrill Perimeter — Create a perimeter wall of 20 foot radius, invisible to all but those adept in magicks. If an enemy crosses this perimeter, this spell releases the shriek of a banshee.

Warped Shield — Passive. If an enemy strikes you with a low-level melee weapon, Warp Shield automatically activates to open a portal that deflects this attack. You must not have any portals currently active. Uses mana on activation.

Pocket Worlds — Open and access pocket dimensions. Storage capacity of summoned pocket worlds scales with [INT] of creator.

Silence III — Create a bubble of 20 yard radius in which sound is eradicated. Uses mana to cast, zero mana to maintain. You may only have one bubble active at any one time.

Saved Portals II — Select a location to “save” for future portals. Until your save point is moved, you may always open a portal here, even if it is beyond your current Local Portal range. Mana is used only upon opening the portal.

Stealth Attack III — Passive. 200% boost to damage when unnoticed by enemy.

In Plain Sight — When activated, you have a heightened abilitiy to hide in plain sight, and are able to spot opportunities to break from combat at a higher rate. Scales on [WIS].

Gentle Step — Passive. Your footsteps are dampened on even the hardest of surfaces. Reduce noise of movement by 80%.

Stitch — Create a basic stitch in common fabrics. Ability scales on [CHA].

Improved Cloth Armour — Craft a cloth armour of significantly higher quality, dependent on materials, time and skill level.

Active Effects:

Legacy of Sisyphus:

XP gain increased by +1,400%