Ameena was still shaking as she pushed off his chest to stand. Ellis was staring at the ceiling, the panic of the fall crashing into him like a warhorse. His heartbeat oscillated between trying to break his ribs and stopping altogether. His whole body felt wrong, his skin was on fire and his blood was ice, the temperatures warring against each other and making his whole body writhe from the pain.

  Some unforeseen voice echoed throughout the room. “Kill the mana users! Give them no quarter!"

  “Yes sir!” Came back a deafening cry of dozens of men.

  Ameena’s head snapped up, the shaky hand on his chest going still the moment her eyes narrowed at some unseen threat. Ellis tried to take a shaky breath, but it was too shallow. His lungs started constricting as he gulped like a fish for the air surrounding him.

  His breathing became rapid, all other sounds drowning out as the only sound he could hear was his shallow inhale, and his deathly exhale. He squeezed his eyes shut as his hands clamped over the necklace on his chest, trying in vain to draw in the breath needed to survive. Ellis might as well have been thrown into the bottom of a lake, he couldn’t breathe, he was drowning, he was going to—

  A gentle hand caressed on his cheek, and his eyes flew open to see who was touching him.

  The world came back into focus on Ameena’s face, and two words being spoken over his shallow breathing:

  “Thank you.”

  And then she was gone, striding forward with a snarl into the carnage behind Ellis. The world came back into view with the same ferocity it had left. The screams of his surroundings filled his ears and strangled out every thought he had.

  He took a deep breath in. Ignored the head that flew over him. And let the air leave his body the right way, all the pain going along with it. By some miracle, he was back to normal. Staggering back to his feet, he surveyed his surroundings.

  The shouts and screaming drew his eyes first. They were surrounding Michael, a few breaking off to try and deal with Ameena, who stood outside their formation and kept having multiple versions of Michael pop in and out of existence in the middle of the men.

  The smell was horrendous, dead men releasing their bowels as blood started to coat the floor. Reloading his crossbow while he watched proved to be a chore. He had practiced reloading relentlessly, but shaky hands and a fuddled mind made the process slow.

  He got the bolt in and raised it forward, to see one man break off from the men surrounding Michael, who was fighting his way toward Ameena as she too was being surrounded now, her teeth bared.

  The man who had broken off sprinted towards Ellis, a desperate wail releasing from his lips with every step he took. Ellis watched his feet in fascination, wondering how a man can seem so desperate and so slow at the same time.

  When he was two meters away, raising his sword behind his head in triumphant growl, Ellis raised the crossbow with one hand towards his face and pulled the trigger. He stepped aside as the body flew past him, and plucked the sword out of the air just as it left the man’s grasp.

  Trying to make sure Michael didn’t see him use it, he threw it at one of the men at the back of the large encirclement, skewering him through his armour. When the man went down, Ellis sprinted forward, slinging the crossbow over his shoulder as he jumped into the fight with his Mother’s knife, slashing and stabbing towards any who attacked him. He pumped mana into his ring on reflex, all the cuts and stabs coming his way causing nicks rather than scars.

  Ameena cast illusions all over him, first he was a multitude, then he was taller and bigger, men missing by a hair as they aimed for his false head. Without warning, those illusions disappeared, and a sword slashed across his back, sending him to the floor in the middle of the formation. He fell beside Ameena, who was crouching underneath Michael’s wild sword swings.

  “What’s happening!?” he shouted, his eyes darting at the men closing in, Michael making a screen of fire for them to hide behind, the flames engulfing the men on the floor and raising their desperate moaning into ear splitting screaming.

  “I’m out of mana!” she shouted over the noise, taking her daggers out.

  “So am I!” Michael called, flicking his hand like the ring on his finger was broken.

  “Michael! Buy me some time to reload!” Elllis called, already starting the process.

  Michael was standing over them, but without hesitation Ameena joined him and was standing back to back with the man, shouting at the ring of palace guards closing shut around them.

  A voice rose from behind the encirclement. “Surrender! You are surr—”

  “That’s just more fun for me, dickhead! Bring it!” Michael interrupted.

  About thirty men made a circle around them, but only half of them were actually attacking. Most of the time they were dragging away the men screaming on the ground, while others cradled each other in their arms as they died.

  There was a door at the end of the platform they stood on, which all the nobles had run through earlier. Ameena’s eyes were locked onto it like a cornered tiger.

  “Ellis! Ignore the reloading!” she shouted, breaking a spear head off of the one thrust at her chest, before throwing it with supernatural precision at a man Ellis couldn’t see while on his knees. “Michael! Get us to that door!”

  “Your wish is my command!” he called back, turning around and ignoring the spear that stabbed him in the back.

  He picked her up with one hand as she screamed obscenities at him, and threw her over all the heads of the palace guards surrounding them and the spears that tried to reach up to hit her in the air.

  She landed on her side with a thump, before rolling into a crouched position, flicking the hair out of her face. Five men broke off the encirclement to follow her, and holes started popping up in the men surrounding Ellis and Michael.

  “Michael!” Ellis shouted, sliding and sidestepping all the spears suddenly being thrust toward him.

  “What!” he shouted.

  “Throw me too! But in the air, like earlier! Got something you're gonna like!”

  The words had barely left his mouth before Michael’s hand clamped around his bicep and he was flung high into the air. The high ceiling hurtled towards Ellis like when he was falling, except this time he was going in the wrong direction. Ignoring the bile that tried to climb out of his throat, he turned himself around in midair thanks to his high dexterity, and aimed down the sight of his crossbow.

  One observant officer fired an arrow at Ellis that missed him by a mile. His voice rang out above the cacophony of noise. “Heads! Watch your fucking heads!”

  The palace guards were too busy being distracted by Michael to keep close track of Ellis. Some managed to heed the warning, getting their heads underneath shields or diving out of the way completely. But only half did so. The rest… well. The rest were slim pickings for Ellis, 9 bolts falling on their heads like iron rain.

  Five men died instantly, the encirclement shattering as they dropped like flies. Michael capitalized on the assistance, grabbing one of the men only wounded from Ellis’s volley and throwing him at a group of men still standing together. They crashed to the floor in a heap of tangled limbs and worried shouts.

  Michael cocked his head at that. He flung his sword to the side, impaling a man through the head like an after thought, rolled up his sleeves, and then picked up one of the bodies at his feet to throw at the onlookers.

  The makeshift… projectile slammed into a group of three men trying to restart their shield wall. They crashed into the floor, like the men before them. Michael picked up two more bodies, and started swinging them around like giant maces, every guard coming into contact with the ‘flails’ being thrown to the floor.

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  Ellis was still flying through the air as he watched this, and surprised himself by managing to reload a bolt while still suspended. He didn’t fire, just slung it back over his shoulder and hoped it wouldn’t go off, before angling himself to fall on one of the groups Michael had knocked to the floor.

  The landing sent a jolt through the tips of Ellis’s toes all the way up to the hair on his skull, but he rolled through the pain and sprang up onto his feet. Sprinting past Michael’s onslaught, he headed towards Ameena. She’d taken a few cuts, but she was holding her own, dodging and slashing, keeping three men at bay with a guttural snarl.

  They really love their encirclements, don’t they? Ellis thought to himself.

  He jumped onto one of the guard’s backs and slit his throat, before using the body to shield a spear coming towards him. Spinning out of the way of another sword slash, he came to a stop beside Ameena, both of them panting. Despite not feeling the pain, he was reminded of the long wound running along his back when blood started dripping into his ass crack.

  “You good?” he asked, ignoring the blood.

  “Dandy,” she replied, throwing her daggers into the remaining two men attacking them. Her aim was true, they died on the spot.

  There were roughly only ten men left, and Michael had cornered them against the glass window with his new ‘weapons’. Ellis let loose one last bolt towards them, hearing a multitude of cries in response. He ignored them.

  Ellis surveyed the carnage. Ten men were left, yes, but at least twenty still lived, if not missing a limb or still trying to recover from being cooked alive in their purple armour. Their gasps and cries of pain snapped into focus for Ellis, and when he tried to ignore it, their desperation only grew louder.

  Ameena took out her knife and walked among them. She reached down to a man trying to crawl away, and dragged her knife across his neck, opening up a new red smile beneath his face. On and on she went, going about the grim task of slitting all the remaining men’s throats. Ellis reached his hand out to stop her, to end this madness.

  It’s a mercy at this point. Just kill them. Get the levels so their sacrifice isn’t in vain.

  His hand froze in midair at the voice. At his voice. Then his arms dropped to his side, as he stepped forward and joined Ameena in the chore. It didn’t take long to finish.

  When he was done, he sat down amid the floor of corpses to catch his breath.

  Michael was still stabbing away at one last man who had managed to live this long… somehow. Ellis wiped at his eyebrow with the back of his hand, trying to stop the blood leaking out of his hair and into his eye in the process. When he no longer had a crimson tint to his gaze, he looked up to see Ameena striding towards him.

  She had to move a corpse to sit next to him, wrinkling her nose at the blood underneath until Ellis waved his hand at her torso. Her new purple chainmail armour was covered in meat. She sat down without a fuss after seeing that.

  “I’m glad your giggles passed. You did well in that fight,” she said, smoothing back her hair before surveying the area.

  I am vile, stop praising me for this. “Thanks, I guess. What’s next?” he asked with a shrug, eyes cast down.

  “Well, we’re in the palace, so we need to head for the throne room. But I tried that door Michael threw me at earlier, and it’s barricaded. We need to look for those tunnels. Your necklace will show us the way.”

  He just nodded in response. She sat with him, just sharing in his company as he stopped sitting on his ass, climbed onto his knees and clasped his hands together. Kneeling before all the bodies, he prayed for a long time, pushing down every flinch at Michael’s approaching footsteps.

  Michael came and sat down next to Ameena. Ellis could hear the man rubbing his hands together and a sick smile perverting his voice.

  “I’m generally not wrong, but I must say that was incredible! So glad you convinced me to go through the mountain rather than the gates, although maybe that would have been more fun now that I think about it?”

  Ellis stopped praying, and sat back down on his haunches. Ameena slapped him in the back, and the feeling of snakes digging into his skin began again. He didn’t thank her for the healing as she said, “You're welcome. Ellis, what’s those ears of yours picking up?”

  “Hundereds of footsteps beyond that door, a few whispers and some speech about how the men must be brave. Oh, and apparently they sent a man to get the regular guard, so this place is about to become an ants nest in a few moments,” Ellis said, his eyes still closed as he honed in on the sounds beyond the door.

  Ameena sighed. “Well, at least we can prepare, I suppose. Status.”

  She looked over her status, assigned a few stats before dispersing it with a wave of her hand. “I leveled twice, by the way. So you two most likely did as well, fill your stats up and then Ellis, you need to lead us through. Michael, put all four stats into mana, your fire is saving us today.”

  With her command finished, she stood and started walking to the wall.

  Michael let loose a low whistle as she did so. “She’s so bossy, but my god I love the way her hips sway as she walks away.”

  He sounded like he was quoting a bad song.

  Ellis ignored him, and activated his truth sight when he opened his eyes. Whispering status under his breath, he saw he had leveled twice, the same as Ameena. Perception was useful, but not in this situation. His endurance had left him wanting a few times, but he had been able to power through three fights in one day while waiting in that forest. So he knew he was fine there too.

  The ring covered constitution, and… with his braces, he was at least as strong as the palace guards at this point. He could not believe he was doing this… but he just wanted to be better than Michael at one thing at least. And it made his crossbow more powerful as a bonus.

  With only some minor trepidations, he put all 4 stat points into dexterity.

  A child of Anwir:

  *Ellis Marsh:

  Strength: 8 (braces of the strong: +4)

  Mana: 5

  Dexterity: 13 (Cloak of the tasteless: +5)

  Perception: 9

  Endurance: 7 (Sleepless pants: +4)

  Constitution: 8 (Minor ring of protection: +1)

  Total: 50 (+14)

  Level: 12

  He thought his hands had grown still before. But now the blood in them felt like it stopped flowing. Testing it slightly, he moved the hand laying in his lap to his knife. He didn’t put that much effort into it, and yet the limb moved in a blur. And the amount of finesse he had as he wrenched the knife out of its scabbard was astonishing.

  He nodded to himself, and looked toward Michael:

  A child of Dumiso:

  *Michael:

  Strength: 20 (Boots of a shieldman: +5)

  Mana: 14

  Dexterity: 10 (Greaves of the quick: +6)

  Perception: 6

  endurance: 11 (Guard’s shirt: +4)

  Constitution: 17 (Breastplate of the immortal: +5)

  Total stat points: 78 (+20)

  Level 17

  He had mostly done as Ameena asked, throwing three of his four new stat points into mana. Ellis started to plan how to fight the monster after this was finished. He had watched the man fight earlier, and he knew that ring would be a problem. He needed to steal it, or lop off the finger once their battle started. It was too much of a hurdle to overcome, even with his newfound speed.

  He took a peak at Ameena’s stats when he finished looking at Michael’s:

  A child of Evosa:

  *Ameena Fray:

  Strength: 10 (Chainmail of the mighty: +5)

  Mana: 18 (Wand of deception (bonded to: Ameena Fray): +5)

  Dexterity: 8 (Pants of the blur: +4)

  Perception: 6

  endurance: 7 (The bard’s ring: +3)

  Constitution: 9 (The boots of the hardy: +4)

  Total: 58 (+21)

  Level 13

  Skills: knit flesh(level 8), mend bone (level 4)

  She still had a few stats higher than his. But he was very confident he could kill her, despite her advantages since his dexterity would make her look like a turtle if they ever fought.

  He joined her near the door. “They’re going to smash through here at any second now by the way.”

  Something heavy cracked against the door after he said that.

  “Then stop gawking, and look for an entrance,” she said.

  Ellis didn’t need to look. His necklace had screamed at him with all the information on every inch of this room the moment he activated it. Ignoring the status screens hanging above all the bodies was hard, so he had honed in on a seemingly innocuous part of the wall. It was quite different though, being made of wood and four times thinner than the rest of the wall surrounding it.

  He walked straight towards that part of the salt lined granite without answering her, and kicked it with all his might. His foot went straight through the brick, and he felt his thigh start to bleed as the stone being held up fell straight onto it. On the bright side it came away with his leg when he tried to wrench it out, and it broke with ease once it was out of the wall.

  Ameena watched him with a raised eyebrow. “Well, you found it. Michael! Come on! We need to leave!”

  Ellis could almost hear the man’s eyeroll before he jogged towards them, surprisingly without any injuries. Ameena must have healed him when they were sitting down.

  “The rubicon has been crossed, and it’s going to be a great time,” he said as he walked into the hole in the wall.

  “What?” Ellis asked.

  “Don’t worry about it. Come on, we got nobles to kill.”