As if some sort of invisible signal had gone off, everyone sprung into action at the same time. Owl’s bow dissolved off his back, immediately reforming in his hands with an arrow already nocked that he fired directly at Asher. Through some miracle, Samantha fired at the same time, her enchanted arrow colliding with Owl’s shadow one. The violet arrow wasn’t nearly as powerful as Owl’s but it still managed to knock the shadow arrow off course just enough that it merely grazed Asher’s cheek rather than punching straight through his head. Asher hadn’t been able to slip into the astral to dodge it, as he started the fight by using Distortion to reach out and grab Moxy, pulling her into his rift to keep her safe while she finished healing. He’d made the right call, too, as Wolf had immediately lunged forward, his shadow spear growing nearly ten feet and stabbing straight through where the warrior had been crouching a split second before.

  Slashing down, Asher cut through the head of Wolf’s elongated spear before the man could swing it sideways at the two of them, and he felt a spray of water hit his cheek as Samantha used Fountain to cover herself, activating her speed boost from Wet Warrior. Not a moment too soon, either, as the hunter twisted to the side with her inhuman speed, narrowly dodging another shadow arrow aimed for her head this time around.

  “You take Owl, I got Wolf!” Asher shouted, not waiting for a reply as he threw himself forward with Distortion. He hated the idea of leaving her to face one of the Knuckles on her own, but he didn’t think they stood a chance of fighting two-on-two. Owl and Wolf moved and acted practically in sync, as if they’d trained to carry out missions like this all the time. He knew better than anyone just how good a shot Samantha was with her bow, so all he could do was trust in her abilities as he dealt with his own opponent.

  Wolf proved to be even more quiet than Owl was, not saying a word as he spun his spear overhead and lashed out with a flurry of quick strikes, conjuring a new spearhead out of shadows from the back-end of his spear to replace the one he’d lost. Asher slipped into the astral realm to dodge the barrage of well-aimed strikes as he sprinted forward. But just before he could exit and launch his attack, Wolf dropped into the shadows at his feet, vanishing completely.

  With a start, Asher realized his mistake, and he reacted without thinking. Focusing on Recall, the world shifted and he teleported the short distance he’d just put between him and Samantha, appearing beside her just in time to block the thrust of Wolf’s spear with his daggers.

  Of course the Knuckles wouldn’t just let him turn this into two separate one-on-one fights. They had to know they held the advantage in a two-on-two as well, and they weren’t about to give that up so easily.

  That said, Asher could always force the issue.

  Throwing himself at Wolf once more, this time, Asher activated Spatial Lock, conjuring an impregnable bubble around the two of them. No form of teleportation or movement ability could be used to escape his skill, and he grinned as he rushed the trapped Knuckle. Wolf didn’t seem all that concerned, merely turning his focus to dealing with Asher rather than trying to attack Samantha from behind.

  Just like when he’d tried to fight Owl, Asher quickly discovered that landing a blow against the Knuckle was practically impossible. Despite the fact that he should have the advantage in such close range when it came to his daggers against Wolf’s spear, the Knuckle’s shadow form flickered and moved about too fast for him to actually connect with his blades. Not even compressing space in front of his attacks was enough. Wolf continued to teleport from shadow to shadow, and Asher ended up spending more time focusing on dodging spear thrusts erupting out of the grass at different angles than he did making his own attacks.

  A shooting pain through his Eternal Mark signaled that Samantha had gotten hurt, and Asher grit his teeth, deciding he didn’t have time to mess around. Waiting for Wolf to erupt out of another one of his shadows, Asher yanked his secret weapon from his rift and ripped the cork off. His timing was flawless, and both he and Wolf’s shadow-body were suddenly covered from head to toe in an explosion of bright-blue specks of magadrine powder.

  “Try that one on for size,” Asher grinned, using Complete Resilience to purge the effect of the powder immediately after it was absorbed into his body. Having used one of his three bottles just the other day against Talon, he hadn’t wanted to pop another from his dwindling supply so soon. But Samantha needed his help, which meant he needed to wrap things up here quickly.

  Expecting to see Wolf collapse to the ground in near-instantaneous death, it was nearly Asher who died when instead, the Knuckle ignored the powder completely, thrusting his shadow spear straight through his head.

  What? Asher blinked, barely having slipped into the astral in time to dodge the unexpected thrust. The sparkling blue powder covering Wolf’s body faded away as quickly as ever, but seeing as the man hadn’t even stumbled, it was clear it hadn’t affected him. Magadrine powder was created to be the perfect poison! It should take down even someone with an evolved poison resistance!

  Perhaps even more concerning was when Asher didn’t immediately reappear, Wolf decided he didn’t want to wait around. Yet instead of turning and attacking the near-invisible barrier of Spatial Lock in an attempt to break it and get out, instead, Wolf sank into the shadows on the ground.

  Reappearing outside Asher’s Spatial Lock, directly beside Owl.

  “What?!” Asher shouted, his Spatial Lock dissipating as he returned to the material world, staring at the twin assassins in utter disbelief. That shouldn’t be possible!

  Stolen story; please report.

  He didn’t have time to complain, however, as he took in Samantha’s current state. The hunter was panting rather heavily, and her body was covered in jagged gashes that she was desperately trying to heal up with Soothing Spring. It was beyond impressive that she’d managed to hold on as long as she had, as without her wings and outside of a forest, she was relying solely on her Water element and her enchanted bow.

  Though come to think of it, the Knuckles have only ever really shown us Shadow skills. Actually…

  Have they really shown us any skills at all?

  Like a lightbulb had gone off in his brain, Asher gasped as everything finally clicked into place. The way the two knuckles seemed nearly identical to one another, almost as if they were using the same skill. How they spoke in exactly the same manner, their voices echoing indistinguishable from one another. How each Finger was assigned a Knuckle to keep watch on them and relay orders from the Head when necessary. There was only one explanation that explained both how Wolf was completely immune to Eight’s infamous magadrine powder, and how the Knuckle had managed to bypass his Spatial Lock as if it hadn’t even existed.

  “They’re not real!” he shouted, stepping over to Samantha and handing her a potion of Lesser Restoration. Both Owl and Wolf paused in their assault at his shout, watching him as though wanting to hear what he was about to say. Happy to take whatever breather they were willing to give, he continued. “They’re not real,” he repeated as Samantha downed the potion without hesitation, gasping for air as her many wounds quickly healed up. “Wolf just phased out of my Spatial Lock somehow, which is impossible. I’d thought it was weird how easily Owl followed me from Whikoga to Dormaul, but he didn’t follow me at all. Seeing how Wolf just reformed his body beside Owl, I’m willing to bet the Knuckles can reform beside one another whenever they need to. Owl must have done the same with the Knuckle positioned in Dormaul. Hell, or maybe that wasn’t Owl at all, they all look and sound completely identical besides their weapons.”

  “Wait, what are they then?” Samantha asked, taking advantage of the lull to nock another arrow and spray herself down with a fresh layer of water, ensuring Wet Warrior was topped off.

  “They’re a skill. The Head’s skill,” Asher said, watching the two stationary shadow-men who continued to simply stand there, unmoving beyond the shadows rippling across their bodies. “It’s the only thing that makes sense. The shards that the Fingers collect are given to the Knuckles for transport, and the Knuckles relay the Head’s orders. I have no idea how the Head has such an insanely powerful skill, but the ten Knuckles? I don’t think a single one of them is an actual person.”

  “What kind of skill allows someone to conjure up ten highly lethal assassins to do their bidding?” Samantha demanded. “That’s ridiculous!”

  “I don’t know… But I think it’s safe to assume it’s one that’s already been evolved to the third tier. In fact, I bet it’s a blended skill gained during the Stage of Bleed. Some of them can have truly crazy effects.”

  Asher’s mind went back to the two different elemental-kin he’d met in this world so far. Wilna, a craston working in Whikoga’s library, and Helpha, a ferrum who mined, smithed, and sold her own weapons in Dormaul. One was the result of a blended skill from someone with the Life and Porcelain elements, and one was the result of a blended skill from the Life and Iron elements. If blended skills could create permanent, living beings that outlived their own creators and could even absorb their own elements, the thought of a skill capable of creating highly-lethal shadow assassins wasn’t too much of a stretch.

  He didn’t know why the two Knuckles had decided to stand there and do nothing while he talked, but it seemed the pause in the fighting had finally come to an end. Asher half expected Wolf and Owl to start clapping in unison before the Head themselves rose from the shadows to give some grand monologue about how they’d never had friends as a child, so they decided to make their own, but that didn’t happen either.

  Instead, they spoke.

  “It has been many years since someone lived long enough to put the pieces together,” the Knuckles spoke in unison, their already echoing voices sounding all the stranger with two of them speaking at the same time. “It is a rare feat. Rare enough that the Head is willing to give you a second chance, despite your actions. If you come with us willingly, you will be made the Head’s right hand man, entrusted with power you couldn’t possibly conceive of.”

  “Hard pass,” Asher said, noting the slight nod Samantha gave him as he tightened his grip on his daggers. “I don’t get the feeling the Head is really the sharing type. Though I have to ask… You guys always refer to the Head like they’re a different person. But if you’re a part of their skill… Does that mean the Head is the one constantly referring to themselves in the third person? Like some sort of confused middle-schooler?”

  “Bold of you to give up on a chance of life at this stage,” the two spoke, readying their weapons once more. “You saw how attempting to fight against the power of the Head turned out for you just a few minutes ago. They did not peg you as quite so foolish.”

  “So long as we’re being honest with one another here, you caught us at a bad time,” Asher said, grinning as Samantha drew back her arrow, aiming it straight for Owl’s chest. “I think you’ll find we’re a little bit harder to take down now that you’ve lost the element of surprise.”

  “Doubtful,” Wolf said, falling into the shadows at his feet and erupted out of Asher’s own, his spear aimed straight for the underside of his chin. In response, Asher used Distortion to jerk his head out of the way, before opening up his Personal Rift.

  Moxy’s fist exploded as it impacted with the side of Wolf’s head, the blast of air sending the Knuckle flying, tumbling head over heels before it finally hit the ground and slipped into one of the many shadows. Bouncing on the balls of her feet, Moxy shook out her fist, smiling wickedly as Wolf stepped out of Owl’s shadow once more, good as new. The hole in her chest had been completely healed through, and the warrior looked almost angry for a change. Asher knew she despised assassins and sneak attacks from behind, and he had a feeling the Knuckles were about to find out just how much she disliked them.

  “Damn, that felt good!” Moxy laughed, bringing up her fists and narrowing her eyes at the shadow-men. “I’m ready for round two!”

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