She couldn't see the creature anymore.

The sun had set what felt like just a moment ago and the light of the moon and the stars weren't enough to see clearly in this dark, oppressive forest.

This cursed, horrid forest that attempted to kill her at every turn. This evil, haunted wood where she was constantly being watched, where she could constantly feel breathing down her neck. The sound of howling wind and rustling branches filled her ears, and she couldn’t tell if it was growling she could hear underneath it, or… something else.

The moonlight was just enough to cast moving shadows that could hide the motion of anything, especially a sleek, dark, predator, but she should be able to see it!

She had assigned her point to Nerve, her eyes were good! Far better than they had been. From her vantage point as high up in this tree as the branches could bear her weight, where the trees are sparse enough to see the ground, she should be able to see it! She had been able to see it.

But for one moment, she had lost focus, and it was gone. She knew it was there, she could feel it, stalking, pacing, but she couldn't. See. It.

Back when this thing had first chased her up this tree this morning, she had emptied her quiver at it. She had chosen the bow, just over two days ago now, so that she wouldn't have to get close, wouldn't need to feel the splash of blood. Two dozen arrows were fired, and she had hit the thing twice.

It wore her arrows like a crown, she knew. One buried in its shoulder blade, the other in its pelvis, barely pierced deep enough to stick. She hadn’t fired with enough strength, or maybe didn't have enough strength in her to cripple or kill.

Two hours later, she let her last hope of rescue fizzle, and she resolved to wait it out.

It has been more than half a day since then, and the thing would not leave. Sure, she couldn't see it, but she knew it was there in the same way she knew her heart beat and muscles ached. It was there. It wanted to kill her.

Carefully, she used the shortsword held in a white knuckled grip to cut a small length of green wood off a nearby branch, and slowly, agonizingly slowly, cut a notch in one end and shaved the other to a point. Then, she reached over her quiver full of branches to place in on top of the pile, the nest of dozens upon dozens of improvised arrows wedged into a crook of the tree.

It was going to be a long night.

*****

She woke sometime in the early morning with bruises stippling her back like leopard spots, where the tree branches she was cradled in had dug in, after she had given in to exhaustion.

The sun was just beginning to its face over the horizon, and it had yet to begin warming up the chill wind that cut through her thin clothes like razors.

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There, in the dim morning light, she saw it. Curled up, with its back to a tree, slept a monster.

It had the haunches and snout of a wolf, but the claws and overlapping scales of what she imagined a dragon would have.

It wanted to kill her.

Run or Fight? Run, or fight? She had to choose. She had already tried hiding and the thing was still here.

Run. I tried killing the thing with real arrows and couldn't do anything, so run.

She began easing her way down the tree branches as slowly as she could, dropping foot by foot until she felt something under her hand give way, and a sharp cracking sound filled the air.

It wasn't loud, it was barely audible over the wind, but it was enough to betray her.

The monster’s eyes snapped open, and it began to snarl softly as it lurched to its feet and she scrambled back up the tree, making her way back up to her stash as it began to pace once more, back and forth, coming in and out of sight.

Fine, no choice but to fight. She pulled her bow from her back and grabbed an ‘arrow’ that she had carved. Bracing herself as best she could with legs around a branch and back to the tree trunk, she took aim and fired. As it skittered off the thing’s scales and down its flank, she was already reaching for another from the massive pile.

Two dozen arrows later, she was making contact with most of her shots, but she physically couldn't pull the drawstring back anymore, and needed to take a moment to rest. The thing never stopped pacing, never stopped snarling, as she did everything she could to calm her breathing.

She had no way to tell time up in the tree other than the motion of the sun, so she had no way to check, but it felt like her muscles were recovering faster than normal, and after what was probably 15 minutes, she was ready to pick her bow back up.

This set of arrows, she actually made one stick, landing in a chink in the armor on the monster’s side, and the green wood the arrow was carved from only made it in about an inch before splintering, but the creature’s hiss of released air was music to her ears. It even seemed to be limping slightly.

The next set, long after a normal animal would have given up in search of easier prey, three of her thirty arrows fired made it past the armor of the creature, and it was definitely limping at this point.

Halfway through the next stretch of arrows, she got greedy. The monster was visibly injured, and as she managed to lodge an arrow between its shoulder blades, as it paced out of view, she leaned forward to get a clearer shot. The branch underneath her, that had borne her weight for a hundred arrows now, cracked as she took her weight off the trunk and she barely even realized she was falling before her knees hit the soft ground.

She staggered to her feet, her now heavily bruised knees slowing her as the monster limped towards her. She barely managed to get her sword out of its scabbard before it reached her, and was too slow to avoid the monster’s swipe, aimed right towards the center of her chest.

As the thing latched onto her shoulder with powerful fangs bearing down, she began stabbing, blindly, anywhere she could reach, until eventually, the thing’s jaws relaxed as it fell dead at her feet.

Covered in blood, sweat, and grime, she numbly backed up until she felt tree bark at her back, and slid down to a sitting position. She couldn’t tear her eyes from the monster’s corpse as her body began to convulse, breath suborned by wracking sobs.

As she steadily processed the pain, she realized that the only places she hurt were in her legs and back, places injured by the night in the tree and the fall, and her chest and shoulder barely hurt at all. Questing hands found that while the leather of the breastplate she had bought at the beginning of this round was torn, almost shredded, her clothes and skin underneath were untouched. It had likely saved her life, saved her from bleeding out in this godforsaken forest.

[Performance assessed]

[Title acquired! Complete round to claim.]

….What?