The fight had not taken long, but he felt like it was unlikely that he would have a long time before someone else came. It was silent now though. The only noise was his breath and the whimpering of the girl still tied to a tree in the center of the clearing.

Aaron went to work, he grabbed the blade that had pierced through his shoulder and went over to the closest corpse. He stripped the shield warrior off his breastplate and belt. The man had lost his shield a while back, but still had a few pouches at his belt. Some of which looked oddly familiar.

Potions. The same kind, that he had used in the Hall of Illusions.

Aaron put the belt aside and gauged the mans height to his own, but the man was smaller than him, so it was not a great match and the man's clothes were not the greatest either. Heavy armor would probably hinder him more than help him, although he was fairly sure that it would not impede him from using Wind Steps, so his mobility might not be too bad even in heavy armor.

The mans chainmail followed after the breastplate, but for now he left him in his trousers and shoes. Getting the chainmail off the body was a pain, because of the arrow in the mans back, but oh well.

The Longsword warrior was not much better. Aaron’s liberal use of a dagger had destroyed most of the leather armor and besides another belt with two potions and a coin pouch, nothing much was of note, besides the longsword itself of course. It was by far the best looking weapon in the groups arsenal and the man was almost his height.

So the swordsman’s pants and shoes had to come off, while he left the mans tattered and bloody gambeson and chainmail on the corpse.

The man also had a backpack to Aaron’s surprise and he opened it curiously after pulling it out from underneath the man. In it he found a rope, rations, two waterskins, more potions. All useful and Aaron put the backpack aside, while he went over to the last man.

The Axe warrior had died the quickest, but he had also injured Aaron the most with that Bull Charge skill.

The mans clothes were entirely intact and with glee Aaron stripped the man entirely.

He was a few inches taller than Aaron, but that was fine.

The man also wore a backpack with much the same in it as the swordsman, well not entirely, there was also a fire-starter kit in there, a bedroll tied to the outside of the pack and what Aaron thought to be a tent of some sorts?

Aaron got out of his rags and got into the dead men's clothes. The swordsman’s pants and boots fit him the best and the axe warriors chainmail and fur lined coat over a leather gambeson were warm and comfortable. Aaron felt immediately much better. He kept the axe warriors pants and boots and stuffed them in the emptier backpack.

He would have to unpack and consolidate the backpacks, so both could be useful, but for now he just made sure that he got everything he wanted stored away. The potions he had found looked exactly like the ones he had used in the Hall of Illusions, but he had no reason to test their efficacy for now.

He wondered if the mage had mana potions and looked over to her corpse and froze.

The woman’s corpse was not where he had left her.

She was gone.

Aaron stared in disbelief, before he spotted drag marks in the snow. His eyes narrowed and he pulled out the dagger out of the naked axe warriors corpse and followed the marks.

He did not have to walk far, only a few steps around the next tree.

The woman crawled and dragged herself away from the clearing slowly, her breath wheezing and strained. Her fingers tight around her staff as she used it to drag herself forward in a desperate attempt to escape.

Aaron kicked the woman’s hand and the staff clattered away. Then he flipped her with the tip of his new boots on her back.

The woman’s deep blue eyes stared up at him in glassy panic, but Aaron ignored her gaze and instead stared at the woman’s throat.

Her left hand was clasped around her throat and from her fingers sprouted a thin coat of ice that had closed the woman’s grisly wound. Aaron could see blood pulse through the thin transparent ice that was melting from her body heat in one moment. But in the next moment the ice froze back.

The woman’s eyes were focused inwards and panicked at the same time.

Aaron stared at the woman in awe and realized that it must take all her concentration to keep herself alive.

It was an amazing, awe inspiring display of magic. She had repaired her torn blood vessels with ice. Such fine control with magic, such concentration to constantly replenish the icy seal from her touch alone.

Aaron frowned, knelt down next to her and searched the woman’s belt pouch. In it he found pristine potions, blue and red and at least the red ones he recognized as Healing Potions.

Why had she not used it?

She must not have thought straight, or maybe never had time to focus on anything but keeping herself alive. Aaron curiously bowed over her to look into her eyes.

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The woman’s eyes were glassy, panicked and full of concentration. It really had taken her all of her concentration to keep up the spell and she probably had crawled away out of sheer horror, out of instinct.

Aaron pushed the tip of his dagger underneath the woman’s chin, but she did not react.

He hesitated.

She was his enemy. She had sent ice shards at him, had burned him. He could still smell the distinct stink of burning hair in the air and yet, he hesitated.

Why?

Aaron had never hesitated before, he had killed dozens of women, had abducted and murdered them in cold blood.

This woman was not innocent, she had attacked him, had followed the order to kill him.

Aaron’s grip on his dagger tightened and the tip drew blood as he steeled himself to end her.

"Please..." a whisper of a voice made him look up from her throat and he stared into blue eyes, now clear.

Tears trickled out of the corner of her eyes as she mouthed a voiceless plea again. Begged him not to kill her.

Begging and crying had never really bothered Aaron before, but now no matter how hard he tried, he could not bring himself to push the dagger into her flesh, as he stared into her blue eyes, wide in panic.

He did not understand why he could not bring himself to kill her. Was it because she was a woman?

Sure she was pretty, even with her pale bloodless face, her disheveled dark hair damp with sweat and half buried in snow. But that had never been a problem to him before.

No, it was the look in her eyes, the desperate pleading, the despair. The woman had stopped casting the ice spell when she had felt the dagger and he could see that the ice was melting now and that she would die even if he did nothing.

Slowly he came to a decision, a decision part of him did not like.

He did not leave survivors. Ever.

But he found himself sheathing the dagger at his new belt and pulling out a healing potion, almost against his will.

He uncorked it and slowly put it to the woman’s lips. The woman’s eyes were wide in fear, terror and now hope.

Then he upended the potion and the woman tried to drink, tried to swallow, but could not with the cut through her throat. Aaron watched as she choked on the magical liquid and watched as her throat closed and healed within seconds. Slowly the ice receded and her wound closed where the ice left.

Finally she gasped and breathed, her fingers blue from the cold, her breath shallow and she gave Aaron one last look, before her eyes rolled back in her head as she lost consciousness.

Aaron looked down at the woman he knelt besides and wondered why he had done this. He did not understand his own actions and for a moment he was debating on snapping the woman’s neck, before he shook his head.

With robotic movements he emptied the woman’s pouch and gathered her staff.

Then he went over to the rangers corpse.

He could not dwell on this any longer, he had to go.

The ranger had been shredded by the magic icicles and the fall from the tree had broken her neck. She would have died twice over if she had not been already dead.

Aaron recovered from her a sheathe for her dagger, another coin pouch and her quiver of arrows. Then he went to look for her bow.

He gathered all the equipment he had looted together and studied his haul.

He wore a full set of leather and pelt armor with chainmail, but he he decided to leave behind any other armor besides the second chainmail maybe. No, unnecessary weight to bring the other chainmail. There were also two swords, one longsword, one shortsword, which he sheathed and decided to keep. The two daggers he put at his belt, while he slung the belts with the swords around his torso. The bow and quiver followed suit, although it was very uncomfortable and it would take him time to get the bow out, not to speak of arrows.

But for now it was fine. He placed a few potions at his belt just in case he needed them and put the rest he had found in the pack with the tent, where he thought they would be cushioned the most.

Aaron put the gathered coin pouches in the other pack, but hesitated and opened one of them out of curiosity.

Glittering mana stones stared back at him and Aaron grinned delighted.

Well that was an amazing find, he had almost forgot mana stones were currency in this world and he could probably use them to improve his cultivation and he could pay the cultivators with this many too.

He put one of the backpacks, the one in which he had stuffed the mages staff into, on his back and hesitated before he shrugged and put the breastplate on as well.

So far he did not feel encumbered by any of this. It felt light, almost weightless to him and even with the breastplate he fastened with leather straps around his shoulders and waist, that did not change. With a grunt he strapped the second backpack around his front and so he stood up and took a few steps.

A bit uncomfortable and unbalanced, but oh well, a second backpack would be useful, he was not about to leave that behind.

It was time to go.

He studied the Clearing one last time critically, wondering if he had missed anything and his gaze stopped at the unconscious, but very much alive female mage. He tore his eyes away from her with a frown and focused instead on his hostage. The young woman shivered and sobbed. She had sagged to her knees and he could see snot and tears had stained her blindfold.

He felt genuinely bad for her and sighed. He walked over to the woman and his hostage froze and stilled entirely as she heard footsteps in the snow.

Aaron went around the young tree, she was tied to and unsheathed one of his blades. He cut her loose and the woman fell forward into the snow, whimpering.

He sheathed his blade again, sighed and stepped next to her.

"I am really sorry for this. But I had no choice.

Just know this, you are not responsible for any of this, I tricked you, lied to you and used you as bait. I doubt I can do or say anything to make this better, but..." Aaron opened the backpack in front of him and fished out one of the Manastones. He bowed down, took her hand and placed the stone into her shivering palm.

"This is all I can do for you. I am sorry. Goodbye."

Then he got up and walked away from the clearing into the forest. First he followed the footsteps of the group, to mask his passing, before he jumped onto a deer trail. For 10 minutes or so he walked along it, before he started to run in another direction and then he used what little Qi he had in him by this point to fling himself up into the trees.

Like Tarzan he swung himself from branch to branch and kept to the trees for as long as he could, before he got down to the ground again. The forest swallowed Aaron up. The silent winter landscape serene and still.

Aaron grabbed a fallen branch from a fir tree and started clearing his footsteps behind him until he felt something cold land on his head and he looked up.

It had started to snow and Aaron took a deep breath, before he disappeared in the wilderness.

The snowfall would hide his footsteps and he doubted unless they had dogs that they would find him in the short term.