Rather than a team of elite Rovers like the ones that had guarded Vaelor, or a swarm of moderately skilled combatants, all that emerges from the bushes is a single Rover.

Albeit this Rover is unlike any I've ever seen before, they’re wearing nothing, no armour and no clothes.

The only thing that covers them is blood and bright yellow warpaint, and upon closer inspection, I can’t help but think that they’re actually inhuman.

They have no genitalia and I can’t see any pupils in their eyes, it’s just pure white, not even a single red vein throbs within those milky depths.

Is this even a they? Or is it, well an it?

I want to say it’s some sort of summon but it looks to human for that, far too human.

The way it walks with that arrogant swagger is very reminiscent of pretty much every Rover I’ve encountered.

It’s also holding two swords, or is it a sword and a half?

One of them glows with a faint red hue, while the other’s broken in half.

As it stalks closer towards us, I start to feel just how wrong this thing is.

Apart from the non broken sword which pulsates with energy, this creature also leaks arcane power, nothing I’ve met has ever done this before.

The human mages don’t leak magic, nor do my fellow summons, the only things that give off this sort of immense magic signature are enchanted weapons and spells.

An illusion perhaps?

I don’t have any memories from Coralet about whether that sort of magic is possible or not but it’s the only thing that I can think of that makes sense.

There’s also the fact that this creature doesn’t have any daggers, nor does it have anywhere that it could have stored a dagger or two, so someone else must have thrown that enchanted dagger at me.

Carefully scanning the surrounding trees just in case there’s anyone lurking up there, I slip a few tendrils into the dirt and then hurl the soft soil at the Rover illusion.

Instead of dissipating the illusion or flying through the creature, the clumps of soil patter against its chest and then fall down to the forest floor with a gentle thump.

I barely have the time to register the fact that this abomination of a human is real before it charges at us, sprinting across the grass with a gait even more impressive than a horse’s.

I chuck every sword I have at it, hoping that the numbers will make up for my poor accuracy.

Yet my hopes are quickly dashed as it contorts its body and dodges every single sword, it doesn’t even slow down slightly, in fact it speeds up.

And with dread, I realise it is sprinting straight towards my eye, I only have a few more seconds left so I grab more clumps of dirt and throw them at it.

All I do is make it slightly more messy, which is nowhere near what I was after.

Then, just before it reaches me, operating purely by instinct, I lash out with my tentacles, leaning forward to meet its charge with my outstretched limbs.

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And by some miracle, I manage to bash it on the side of its head but it doesn’t even flinch and even though it's thrown off balance by the force behind my attack, its speed carries it straight into me.

Thankfully its attack is somewhat diverted thanks to my lucky strike so it only slams its red sword into the corner of my mouth rather than directly into my eye but I have to swiftly duck down since it swings its sword diagonally through my mouth to try and hit my eye.

I literally see the violent blade come within an inch of my eye.

There’s no pain to ignore which means I get to put all of my focus into hurriedly backing up.

In my panic, I forget the Empire soldiers behind me and knock over a few of them as I quickly get away from the monster.

I can’t fight this thing, all I can do is try and delay it from killing me and these soldiers so that my creator can flee.

I try to force my panic through our link but fail miserably, which is magnificent since that means she’s far away from me and this abomination.

It's ironic, I exploited the morale of the Rovers and even looked down on them for becoming panicked and now here I am recovering my own morale, I didn’t even know I could lose it.

Perhaps a fear enchantment?

Or am I really afraid?

I’m leaning towards the former because the Arthians are holding their ground, they’re getting butchered by the fiend and yet they keep on suicidally attacking it.

Despite a good amount of them literally throwing themselves at the abomination though, it somehow dodges them each time and kills them all with one blow.

Either cleaving off a head or thrusting its sword through a heart seems to be how it prefers to kill its foes.

In the short time since my withdrawal, it has already massacred a full thirty of my allies.

Just how can something like this possibly exist?

Breaking myself out of my stupor, I quickly look around just in case the Rover who had thrown the dagger is going to get involved, before darting back into combat.

I’m about twice as tall as a human so while it’s not ideal and a bit uncomfortable, I lift myself up as high as I can and tower over my human allies.

Now if it tries to attack me it’ll have to leap at me, which should help lower its manoeuvrability.

Striding forward I move overhead the Empire troops, I feel almost like a piece of seaweed bobbing above a series of waves.

Once I’m close enough to attack the fiend I sweep my limbs down at it, accidentally whipping some of my allies in the process and subsequentially losing most of my overextended limbs to its vicious counter attack.

It doesn’t even fall for my ploy, it just ignores me and continues butchering my human comrades.

They’ve got it surrounded but all that means is that it can attack in every direction, it's not even alarmed in the slightest.

Honestly, it’s actually kind of concerning just how foolhardy the Arthians are, they’re simply refusing to give an inch of ground to this fiend and it’s costing them dearly.

Not content to create a corpse hill by just standing its ground, the abomination begins to advance further into our formation, slashing left and right as it does so.

Bisecting people with its unbroken sword while slitting the throats of its woefully weaker opponents with its broken one.

Forcing my mana into my severed limbs I prepare to give attacking it another go, but by the time my limbs are regrown another twenty soldiers are dead.

I don’t have many human allies left, my attacks are proving useless and my cunning ploy is either seen through or ignored by this brute.

So, I decide to do something stupid, my creator isn’t here so I can afford to be a little idiotic and if I don’t do something we’re all going to die here.

Not that it seems like these humans care, I’m going to have so much to ask my creator if, no, when I see her again.

Leaping towards the fiend I open my mouth wide, daring it to pierce my eye and lose an arm in the process.

And with what I can only assume to be contempt, it chucks its broken sword into my mouth, destroying my eye with pinpoint accuracy.

I’m so stupid, I never even considered that the damaged sword could still be enchanted and now I’ve paid the price.

My blindness is only temporary as my form quickly dissolves into nothing and I’m freed from the shackles of a physical body, becoming bound instead to the limitations of an immaterial one.