The Last Experience Point

Anelia wasn't exactly a "trusting" person, and she certainly wasn't submissive. Sure, she had no problem taking a broad, general set of directions from a client, but how she went about realizing her goals was typically her own domain, and that wasn't something she could ever imagine herself reconsidering…

…except for this time.

Alex, a kid in his early-mid 20s, had somehow actually convinced her to cast aside her own will and to instead follow his precise, moment-by-moment instructions. He'd told her to do exactly what he said and not to deviate in the slightest. This was something that went against all of her natural instincts and years of unglamorous, dirty work. But in this case, it turned out to be the right decision to make.

"If we get hit with CC, it's over," he said. "Watch out for that root!"

Anelia jumped backwards and away from two electrical wires that suddenly manifested near her ankles, each one sparking in a way that looked painful. The wires attempted to wrap themselves around her ankles and bind her in place. Thanks to the kid's warning, she managed to avoid them.

"And now, Anelia! Shoot!"

Anelia raised her guns, took just a fraction of a second to aim, and she fired—and hit. Amazingly, incredibly, she actually hit. Even as Iron Jaik extended his shield to intercept, Anelia could see he would be too slow. Her shots whizzed right by him, sailed over the head of the Dwarf mercenary, Thangord, slipped between Purple and Tem, and at last came to an end in the throat of the legendary archer assassin, Argald "Keen-Eye" Petim, whose nearly three-decade career ended in just a single instant.

His eyes widened in surprise, his hands raised to clutch his throat, he gargled several times, and then he simply collapsed, his body falling to the ground like a dropped weight. But the brief moment of victory came at a cost. Iron Jaik and Tem were now gunning straight for her, and at the same time, Thangord began sending out groups of ten dark blue, whistling missiles of magic that made erratic movements in the air, twisting, turning, dropping, and rising before all converging on her ten at a time despite the seemingly random paths they traveled to reach her.

Alex shifted his eyes in her direction. "Can you use Ether Guard?"

Finally, an ability she knew—and one she would've used anyway.

Anelia reached out with her left hand and then with her right, both spread wide and to opposite sides of her body. Then, she pulled the triggers on both of her Ether Cannons, but rather than release the triggers, she held them in place and activated Ether Guard. Immediately, a green, bubble-shaped screen of light encapsulated her, and now, all ten of the blue, whistling missiles evaporated upon contact with her barrier, each one making a very muted thud that was likely louder to those outside of her bubble.

He hits hard, she thought, her rate of breathing increasing.

Provided she had enough stamina, Ether Guard worked by stopping all hostile attacks at the cost of stamina per hit, with the amount required differing based on how powerful the attack. Additionally, it was an aura that had a constant tick of Low exertion cost just to keep up—regardless of whether or not she was being attacked. In other words, it drained her pretty fucking fast, and she began to sweat as Tem slashed at her with his longsword and Iron Jaik bashed her barrier with his shield, the latter of which caused her to exhale with a whoosh at the sheer amount of stamina required to stop the attacks.

Her body trembling and her head becoming foggy, she gathered her resolve and continued to maintain the barrier as Iron Jaik raised his shield a second time and Tem drew back his sword, which was now glowing a dark red color as though he'd activated some kind of ability that enhanced his next attack.

Both men then struck at the same time, and the combined attack was more than she could handle. She coughed loudly, her barrier shattered, and she was flung away and thrown onto her back. She landed with a thud on the concrete, and the impact caused her Ether Cannons to slip out of her hands. But she did not despair, for in focusing so heavily on Anelia, the two men had fallen into the kid's trap. She couldn't believe it worked. She just couldn't believe it.

They're out of formation!

A startled cry came from the usually quiet Dwarf. "You fuckin' idiots!" he shouted. "You left your mages wide open!"

Both men spun around, and then both seemed to seize up as they realized Alex was now dashing towards the Dwarf with enough speed and strength that his footwear left cracks in the concrete with each step. Thangord, seeing him coming, raised his staff high up, chanted something, and then swung it down. But whatever he was casting, Alex seemed to already know what it was, because he dashed first to the right, and then to the left to avoid two giant, spike-shaped pillars that burst up from the concrete—all while he kept moving forward.

"Fucker!" Thangord cried out, raising his staff high and spinning it around and around in small circular motions. A green halo eventually appeared above the staff, which he then cast out like a fishing rod as he threw his arms forward. This caused the green halo to make a whining sound as it cut through the air and made straight for Alex, who simply dropped down, came into a slide along the concrete, avoided the attack, and then pushed himself back up to his feet—all without ever coming to a full halt.

Throughout this, Purple tried providing some cover. With his rapier extended, he fired off one Primer Strike II after the next, resulting in several needle-like projectiles of light heading straight for him. But Alex simply batted each one aside with a minimally exertive swing of his blade, almost as though he knew the precise amount of time it would take the super-fast-moving projectiles to reach him.

He wasn't reacting—he was anticipating.

The desperation in the Dwarf's eyes now seemed to reach the level of full-on panic. He made a frantic, last-ditch effort to cast something. But Anelia didn't see what it was. Before he could finish chanting, Alex struck out with his sword, cutting the staff in half, and then he reversed his grip and pulled his sword back in the opposite direction, slicing open the Dwarf's entire stomach. The Dwarf grabbed his sides and let out a wail of pain as he dropped down to his knees, his innards sliding out of the wound like a gutted fish.

Without wasting another second, Alex flicked his wrist off to the left, and what looked like a dart made of light sailed across the wintry morning air and made straight for Purple, who unlike Thangord, seemed capable of reacting to it. Purple swiped across with his rapier, and the dart evaporated into a small, fine clump of dust particles. He then retaliated with more Primer Strike II, to which Alex responded with more of his magical darts, and now, the two traded magical ranged attacks so fast that numerous projectiles went awry and caused several explosions in the distance as abandoned DEHVs were struck and chunks of road were blasted off into the air.

"Anelia wasn't the issue after all," Iron Jaik said, glancing over his shoulder. "We were wrong. He's the real threat."

"Y-yeah," Tem said with a nervous laugh. "We need to kill him quick."

Across the roadway, not far from where Vazzal Shelen was watching all of this unfold with a look of dread on his face that Anelia found utterly satisfying, the two Elves, Trelvor and Seiley, were locked in close-quarters combat with the remaining bounty hunters. Strangely, the white-cloaked boy still had not retrieved his flute. For some reason, he was fighting unarmed and barehanded in a way that seemed more instinctual and animalistic than deliberate. The girl had also abandoned her staff as well. Both were tearing apart their enemies with their bare hands.

"How dare you hurt Her Highness!" Trelvor roared. He grabbed the shoulders of one of the bounty hunters, a man who, mind you, was fully armored in something close to plate. Pulling the man downward so that he bent forward, Trelvor snapped up his right knee and crashed it into the man's jaw so hard that the shape of his face became deformed and the crunch could be heard even from all the way over here.

Seiley, on the other hand, had wrestled a man into a half-standing position with his back bent all the way backwards and his head resting on top of the hood of a badly damaged DEHV. Both her wrists were squeezing the man's throat, and he was attempting to pry her fingers free. But he was dying—and quickly. She was choking the life out of him.

But there was a third bounty hunter, and this one was the one that Anelia worried about. He was a bald man with a gaudy, orange-colored mustache wearing leather armor and wielding a dagger in each of his hands. Having slipped behind the enraged Elves, he was making straight for the princess, who was in too great a shock to notice him coming.

Kalana!

The girl was still on her knees, arms raised, blood dripping out of two empty sockets. Tears were in her eyes, the pain painted all over her face. It must have been excruciating. She didn't even seem aware of the man creeping up on her.

"Kill Anelia quick and then help Purple!" Iron Jaik shouted, his words surreal. Anelia would never have imagined these people working together, let alone asking for "help" from one another. That was the extent to which Alex had thrown them off their game.

Tem nodded. The two were hovering over Anelia, and Iron Jaik was raising both his arms and lifting up his two-handed shield. Without her barrier, it would only take one quick bash over the head to end her life. But she wasn't going to let him have it: not with death approaching Kalana while her two Elvish companions remained oblivious due to the rage that blinded them.

"Get the fuck out of my way!" Anelia shouted. Still flat on her back, she half turned her body over while shooting her left foot forward and crashing it into Iron Jaik's armored knee as hard as she could. Pain exploded in her foot, and she could feel her bones breaking, but none of that mattered, as she hit him hard enough to cause him to buckle and fall. And as he fell, she rose. Grabbing her guns, she stormed back up to her feet and ignored the intense, throbbing pain in her left foot.

"Anelia!" Tem shouted at her as he attempted to slice her open with his longsword. Anelia ducked beneath the swing of his sword and then raised her guns, firing both. The casually dressed, lanky man may have looked and acted unprofessionally, but he reacted in a very professional, experienced way. Without any hesitation, he shifted his fighting stance so that his metal buckler jutted forward, and then two loud pings filled the early-morning air as his shield blocked each of her shots.

But this was just fine, as she'd only intended them as a distraction.

Even as Iron Jaik was picking himself back up, she was already charging directly into Tem's outstretched shield. She collided with it, and though she did not succeed in knocking him off his feet, she did succeed in pushing him off to the side and out of her way. Now, she made a straight sprint down the roadway towards Kalana. Each step sent agony into the already fractured bones in her left heel. The fact that she could will herself to move on it anyway was nothing short of a miracle from the Gods.

One step after the next, she charged down the road towards the princess. Upon reaching Alex and Purple, she almost lost her life in their crossfire, as the two were still hurtling magic back and forth at one another in such a way that it was like being level-1 and running into traffic, only instead of DEHVs, it was magical darts and needles made of light that were speeding across the expressway.

Through luck alone, Anelia managed to get across without being hit, but not before her eyes and Alex's briefly met. And even amid his chaotic back-and-forth with Purple, it seemed he was fully capable of understanding what she was doing and why. And with that, he raised his hand and called upon Bank and Storage—or at least Anelia presumed that was what he did, as an instant later, three rejuvenation stones appeared in the palm of his raised hand.

He didn't need to speak to her. He didn't need to call out to her. She already knew what he intended. And as he threw all three her way, she had already holstered her right-handed Ether Cannon so that she could reach out to catch them. Upon doing so, she continued her dash towards Kalana.

"I'll be a legend for this," she heard the orange-mustached bounty hunter say as he drove both his daggers down towards the shocked princess's neck. Her lack of any reaction was what alarmed Anelia the most. She simply remained in place, trembling slightly, totally unaware.

While darting forward, Anelia extended her left arm, aimed quickly, and pulled the trigger—several times. Again and again, she riddled the bounty hunter with Ether-Shot. Each shot caused his body to jerk and snap, and his head flopped around unnaturally from the impact. Despite shooting him numerous times, he'd likely died instantly after the first hit. And yet, even so, it did not put an end to the downward, plunging motion of his daggers, as he had already been mid-motion, and death was not enough to overcome basic physics. And so, Anelia ignored every last bit of pain that flared in her broken foot as she tore forward down the road and leapt, her body angling forward as she tackled into him.

There was a thud, a feeling of intense, unexpected pain, and then the world flipped over several times before eventually stilling. Now, Anelia found herself on top of the dead man—with one of his two daggers lodged deep into her right shoulder-blade, likely by her own doing. Anelia unleashed a string of swear words, sheathed her other Ether Cannon, and then grabbed the weapon's grip while straddling the dead man's chest.

"You mother fucker," she growled, wincing in pain as she yanked the dagger out of her shoulder. She then ignored the blood that began to pour out of the wound as she tossed the weapon aside and looked back at Kalana.

Panting, she got up and almost fell back over, as it was becoming impossible to keep putting pressure on her foot. Nevertheless, she limped over to the Elvish princess as fast as she could. Her foot finally gave right upon reaching her, and Anelia fell down into a similar kneeling position in front of her.

"Kalana!" she shouted. "Kalana! Answer me!"

Her eyes were blank, her mouth partially open. "Hurts…hurts so bad…"

Anelia looked down at the stones in her palm: two reds and one yellow. Probably exactly enough. Without any further delay, she slapped them down over the princess's shoulder, and all three crushed and vanished, meaning they were accepted.

For several moments, Kalana's eyes remained blank: empty. And then the light returned to them, and she began to hiss and moan as though the pain had just tripled in intensity, which it likely had. As Anelia knew all too well, pain intensity was like an upside-down parabola as it related to death. It got worse and worse until you passed the halfway point—and then it started to diminish, replaced instead by fatigue and a desire to sleep. For Kalana's agony to flare so abruptly, it meant the stones were doing their job.

The poor girl began screaming. "It hurts! It hurts!"

"They're just regrowing," Anelia said, grabbing her and holding her. "You're okay, sweetheart. It won't hurt for more than a few minutes. Especially with your constitution."

"Hurts!" she cried as though the pain was too great to be comforted by such a fact. "Anelia, it hurts! I can't handle it." Tears were flowing down her face, and again, she vocalized her suffering.

"I know it does."

In her face, it looked like the world was collapsing around her—like she had never even imagined something could be this painful. Anelia couldn't blame her. She'd likely be traumatized. After all, losing a limb was an awful experience. And even though she'd be good as new in just a couple of minutes, it still hurt Anelia to see Kalana weeping, whimpering, and barely holding it together.

With the princess in this awful state, Anelia didn't know if she should stay with the girl or go to help Alex, who seemed to be having real trouble with the three bounty hunters. Each one of them clearly had higher stats than he did. And yet, his bizarre, almost robotic knowledge of spells and abilities was saving him time and time again.

Iron Jaik's entire body began to flash—brightly, too, and fast. In total, he flashed about eight times in quick succession, and then he launched himself up into the air before immediately blasting back down at twice the speed while slamming his shield. But he ended up hitting nothing but the road, because Alex had already moved out of the way long before that point; it was as though he'd known what was going to happen—and when it would happen—from the appearance of the very first flash.

Similarly, Tem's blade again began to glow, and he unleashed some kind of supersonic, eleven-hit sword attack. Yet, despite the slashing and slicing being almost too fast to physically follow with one's eyes, Alex was able to easily maneuver his body such that a simple twist of his hips or craning of his neck saw him escape injury or death each time. But he didn't appear to be "dodging" or "evading." His movements came across more as memorized and choreographed.

Both men were growing increasingly frustrated. Anelia could tell from the way they began glaring with their mouths partially open. They were even panting a bit. But Alex was gasping harder. Purple, on the other hand, known for his seemingly endless endurance, provided the two a chance to rest as he fired off more Primer Strike II.

I need to help him.

Anelia tried to get back to her feet—only to realize she couldn't. Her left foot was absolutely shattered. She couldn't even stand. But her pain must've been nothing compared to Kalana, whose yells turned into piercing, ear-splitting screams as two bones suddenly began tearing through her sockets and began growing longer and longer.

Tears flooded her face, and Anelia winced. She'd had to regrow a hand once before. That shit was awful. Just absolutely terrible. Probably one of the worst feelings imaginable and among the least pleasant experiences of her life. Honestly, she couldn't even imagine having to go through that again. Sure, she could do it if she absolutely had to—but it sure wasn't something she hoped she'd need to.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

It was no laughing matter.

*******

Zach laughed at himself as his hand flew across the room and slapped into the stone wall with a bloodied thwap before bouncing off the wall and leaving behind a red handprint. Then it flopped down somewhere beside him.

"Okay, that one was on me," he said with a subsequent, pained hiss as his rapier fell to the ground and he was forced to defend with his Primordial Void Blade. "I got to remember to take you Vixens more seriously."

Having wanted a bit of "morning exercise," he'd decided to capture the last few cards he felt he needed without the assistance of his own cards. You know, to get his blood pumping. Instead, he got it flowing as an entire stream of crimson-colored fluid spurted out of a newly formed stump at the point below his elbow. The red-haired elite-mob had gotten him really good with that rapier.

Well, she is level-65, he thought. The Orcs are only level-60.

Still, having to now waste a red stone on just the second floor of this tower—something he'd already basically mastered—was yet another reminder of how bad it was to become lax or overconfident, and it served as a cogent point of why you should never stop paying attention to your surroundings.

"Yowch, that really hurts," he said calmly with a sigh. "Meh, whatever. Like, it's still not as bad as being burned alive. Now that really sucked."

Zach winced at the memory of it as he recalled being hit by the Orc's fireball and having all of his skin turn crispy like burned meat. Gods, that had hurt so much. This was like a scratch compared to that. The only real issue was having to fight with just one hand.

Luckily, however, the two Legion Portal Guardians were already captured, and the Vixen Portal Commander only needed one more hit to be low enough HP for him to use Card Capture on her as well. And so, with a gentler strike, he removed a piece of her forehead, and then he activated the ability, sparing her from death and turning her into a little orb of white light, which sailed across the room and into his open…

Oh, right, he thought, laughing despite himself. I don't have a hand.

The card bumped off his elbow stump, became stained with red, and then fell to the floor, where it became even more soaked in blood. He wondered if he could wash his cards without ruining or destroying them. Surely he could, right? They weren't actually made of paper. They just felt that way. But really, they were items from the adventuring world. He highly doubted a bit of water would be enough to damage them.

Zach winced as he looked at his severed hand, which was next to his card in a small pool of blood. Across the room, there was a dried but even larger bloodstain from yesterday when he'd lost his entire foot to the closing stone wall after passing out on the other side from E-debt. Right now, that very same wall slid open, granting him access to the steps leading up, and it would remain open this way for around fifteen minutes until the three elite mobs here respawned.

Interestingly, his foot was still there, but the knee-high boot he'd been wearing was gone. Having somehow avoided a full armor break—likely because footwear came in pairs—the boot had actually regrown over his regenerated foot, and so it sort of made sense that it had vanished from his severed one.

"Eww, it's already starting to rot," he said, voicing his thoughts aloud. The toes of his severed "yesterday foot" were turning black, but not like the black of when he'd almost been burned to death, but more like the black of rot. Actually, he was pretty sure he could smell it, too, and there were flies buzzing around it.

That's disgusting.

Turning around, he strolled over to one of his large bags. Earlier, he'd packed them up with the intention of no longer turning back, so he'd brought them with him and was keeping them close by at all times. Taking the ten-or-so steps over to his bags, he left a solid, dark red trail of blood that streaked across the floor from between where he'd just been standing and where his bags sat against the stone wall.

"It's all right," he said. "I'll still have 6 left. Well…assuming I only need one." He began to feel a bit woozy: blood loss. He chuckled. "Probably need a yellow, too."

Zach chose to use the stones from Bank and Storage rather than the emergency ones he kept stuffed under his helm. There was no real urgency here, and he didn't feel like having to take the helm off and put it back on again just for a missing arm. It wasn't even his whole arm, either, but like, maybe 40%. So it should definitely be okay to just use one of each.

Slapping the yellow and the red into his chest, he chided himself for his carelessness. Then he laughed at himself again. It really was funny. Despite knowing all of the Vixen Portal Commander's attacks by heart, he'd somehow become so bored during the fight that he'd begun daydreaming about how fun it would be to own a boat and go fishing. And that was how he'd slipped up.

He laughed. He was a total dope sometimes.

******

"Anelia, I can't!" Kalana shrieked as the bones, having now formed, began to fade as tissue was regrown around them and fresh, new nerves were connected. Soon, she would form the inner-most layer of skin. "It hurts! You dunno. You dunno how bad!"

"I do," Anelia said, clasping her shoulders. "Believe me, I've gone through it before. It fuckin' sucks. I get it."

The princess writhed, her body rocking side to side. She was likely at the pins-and-needles phase as her brand-new nerves restored the connection to her brain.

"I've lost a hand before," Anelia said. "So I know exactly how much it—one second." She stopped speaking, aimed, and fired off a shot from each of her pistols, which Iron Jaik blocked. Although she was a fair distance away, and although she could no longer stand, she could still pop off a few shots every now and again to help Alex, who was sweating profusely and clearly struggling to keep going.

But she wasn't worried. The kid only needed to stay alive for another half a minute—if even that long—as time was on their side, not their enemy's. Already, Trelvor and Seiley were blasting across the road towards Alex to assist him, and from what Kalana had told Anelia, her mother and about thirty Elves were going to be here any second now.

"Retreat!" Purple shouted as he spotted Trelvor and Seiley racing towards him. "This is over. We lost!"

If Anelia had been interested in gambling, she would've bet all her gold on there being no chance that those three bounty hunters would escape. And yet, inexplicably, Iron Jaik, Purple, and Tem all managed to disengage, turn around, and leap off the side of the expressway before the two Elves could reach them. They disappeared into the dense brush beneath, and neither of the two bothered to pursue. Anelia was glad she hadn't bet.

"Oh, Gods," Kalana moaned. "It hurts. It hurts. It hurts!"

She looked like she was going to scream again, but then, abruptly, she stopped as she saw Adim standing before her, his tear-filled face sickened with worry. "Is…is Princess Kalana gonna die?" he asked.

Anelia looked to reassure him, but seeing him this way seemed to overpower the pain Kalana was experiencing, and the princess found the strength to do so herself.

"Of course not," Kalana said. "I'm fine." She even smiled. "And so are you, little guy. You're okay now. Gimme a hug 'cause I don't have working hands yet."

Adim clutched her and cried. "I'm sorry you got hurted, Princess Kalana."

"This is nothin!" she said cheerfully, the pain in her voice still unmistakable to an adult, though probably not to a child. "Hey, where's Peter?"

Adim pointed to the same DEHV he'd pointed to earlier. "He was in that one."

To her right, Anelia noticed that Alex, Trelvor, and Seiley were all hurrying over. Alex strode up to the DEHV's back-left door, grabbed it, and yanked the entire thing off with a loud, high-pitched tearing sound of metal and broken glass. He then threw it off behind him before leaning his body partially inside. "There's no one in here," he said, coming across as alarmed.

"Wh-what?" Kalana exclaimed, getting up to her feet, her hands nearly restored. "What do you mean?"

Alex looked at her. "There's no one else in this DEHV."

"Then…then where is he?"

Anelia looked behind Alex—to where Vazzal Shelen was still standing around as though in shock and unable to determine what to do. He was likely planning to escape during the confusion while attention was placed elsewhere. Yet, the sight of him roiled her. All the anger she'd built up came back in a flood. Even with her left foot completely demolished, she managed to scramble up to her feet and begin hopping towards him on her right.

Slowed and barely mobile, she had no chance of catching him as he spotted her and began fleeing. Thus, Anelia drew just one of her Ether Cannons and fired it. She not only succeeded in striking the man's heel, but she blew his entire foot off his leg. He went down onto his stomach. At the same time, the sound of the gun's report seemed to make Kalana and her Elvish friends flinch, and for the first time, they remembered he was there at all.

Right now, he was trying to crawl away on his belly. But Anelia reached him first. She continued to hop over to him before she allowed herself to intentionally fall forward on top of him. Then, grabbing his shoulders, she rolled him over with her left hand, and with her right, she bashed him over the face, breaking his nose and jaw in one strike. "This is gonna be very, very slow, Vazzal," she said to him, her hands trembling with anger. "I'm gonna take things away from you: slowly. Eyes, cock, fingers, toes. You're gonna feel everything!"

He was already crying in pain from his detonated foot. "You fucking bitch!" he screamed.

"I might be convinced to go slightly easier. If you tell me where Peter is."

"The kid's gone," he said while groaning in pain. "You lost, Anelia. I had him taken away while you were all distracted. I had one more with me, and by now, he's probably made it to the border with Tomb of Fire."

Alex frowned. Anelia couldn't see his body fully from this position, but she could see his legs and knees as he stepped somewhere to her left. "I think he's telling the truth," Alex stated. "This likely isn't a bluff."

"Then he's in for an even worse time," Anelia growled. "He'll die over the course of ten days instead of five." She grabbed his right hand with her left, and then she used her own right hand to yank off his pinky finger, snapping it off his hand like it was a piece of a cracker.

His subsequent screams were so loud that they drowned out everything else.

"You like that, Vaz? Huh? What should I take away from you next? How about your nose? Eyes come later. I want you to really dread that. You're gonna wish you never, ever fucked with—"

"What in the name of Gods is going on here?" Queen Vayra's demanding, regal voice asked as she and an entire entourage of Elves appeared from seemingly out of nowhere. In the distance, peacekeeper sirens were blaring. The damage to the road would likely cost tens of millions in lost economic activity, as this would take at least a week to repair. They'd really made a mess of this stretch of road.

Marching over to Anelia, Queen Vayra looked down at her, and Anelia froze. Then her eyes darted around the scene. First, the queen observed the blood dripping out of the man's hand from where she'd ripped off his pinky finger. Then, she looked at his severed foot. Finally, she narrowed her eyes at Anelia.

"This is unacceptable," she said. At the same time, Kalana joined her side, her hands now fully formed. The girl was squeezing them as though in disbelief that they really were back and good as new. "What you're doing…it's completely unacceptable," the queen said.

"That's right," Kalana agreed, nodding with satisfaction and pride—but this changed as her mother continued to speak.

"Anelia, torture for fun is barbaric. I understand your grievances with this man, and I'll not begrudge you your revenge over this filth. Especially not after he laid hands on my Peter. But this? This is simply too much. No, get a rock and bash in this vile human's head, but for the love of the Gods, cease this deranged, psychopathic behavior. I'll not have you dismember him in some basement. That is not how civilized beings behave."

"M-mom!" Kalana cut in, frowning. "That's not…that's not the point! The point is, he might still know stuff, and even if he doesn't, he's gonna go to jail. We don't kill people."

Anelia, despite being fully aware of the sheer disrespect of it, could not help her reaction. Right in front of the queen, she began angrily berating the princess. "You idiot little girl!" she snapped at Kalana. "Even after having both your hands cut off—even after screaming in pain and crying—you haven't learned a thing, have you?"

"What's this now?" Queen Vayra shouted. "Who did what?"

Anelia briefly explained the situation, and then, rather than chiding Anelia for disrespecting her daughter, her ire was placed solely on Kalana. She seemed especially disappointed at the part where Anelia described the way Kalana had turned down an opportunity to end the fight immediately, choosing instead to punch her assailant instead of stabbing her in the spine.

"Daughter, she is right. You are a fool. This weakness…I am growing tired of it. Very, very tired."

"Compassion isn't weakness," she said defiantly. "And yeah, they hurt me and stuff, but I'm not changing who I am just 'cause of that."

Anelia shook her head. "Your Majesty, this guy right here"—she lifted him up into a sitting position by pulling on the undershirt in his suit—"this piece of shit is the reason all of this happened. He put us through so much pain. I want his head. I demand it."

"Granted," the queen replied immediately. "Kill him. Quickly."

"Thank you."

The man began to shriek and beg. Wasn't that rich? Vazzal fucking Shelen, the big-bad bounty hunter, began to beg. "No! No, please! I'm the only one who can find Peter. You'll never get him back if you kill me! Please, no, please!"

The queen tilted her head to the side. "Hm? What's that supposed to mean?"

Alex's body stiffened, and a nervous look crossed his eyes. "Your Majesty," he began, "we have failed. The…the bounty hunter apparently outwitted us. During the fight, he had someone make off with Peter."

"Hmm? What in the name of the Gods are you talking about?" She pointed. "Isn't that him over there?"

Even while still holding Vaz up by his shirt, Anelia looked behind herself. Kalana, Alex, Trelvor, and Seiley also turned around. Now, Kalana's face lit up, and she made a half-croak, half-squeal of happiness and delight as the sight of a raptor racing down the highway faster than a DEHV appeared at the edge of her vision—one that seemed to be heading straight for her. And mounted atop this raptor was none other than Peter Brayspark VI.

It wasn't just the two of them, either.

"Let me go, you fucking miserable beast!" cried a man's voice.

Only now did Anelia realize a man was being dragged along the road, his face scraping the concrete as the raptor's jaw remained locked on his upper bicep. His body flopped and bounced all over the highway until, finally, upon reaching them, Ruby spat out his mangled, bloodied arm, which was half-severed, and then she made several loud chirping sounds.

"Mommy Kalana!" she said, spinning in circles. "I didn't kill because I know you don't like that. This is the bad guy who took Peter. I told you I'd find him!"

Kalana dove at Ruby, hugging her. "Good girl!" she said. "What a good baby." Then she picked up her adopted brother and hugged him as well. Adim rushed forward as well and embraced Peter.

"Pete!" he said, crying. "I'm sorry! I didn't know they took you!"

"It's okay. Ruby saved me!"

Anelia took a moment to let her heart soften. Then it hardened right away as she once more regarded Vazzal. "Looks like you have no use now." She drew back her arm. "I never wanted to make this quick, but if it's this or nothing, I'll take it."

Vazzal weakly raised his own arm and pointed. "Your little boy…he's watching you."

"Hm?"

"Your little boy is looking."

Anelia again glanced over her shoulder, where Adim was standing, his eyes curious and confused. "Anelia…?"

She growled. "Kalana! Cover his Gods-be-damned eyes."

"Nah-uh," she said, moving to stand next to him. "Stop killing people."

"I…I understand your views on this, but this is different. I have to kill him."

"Why?"

"Because of the disrespect of what he did. It demands blood."

"That's dumb! Nothing demands blood."

Anelia swelled with anger. And shockingly, the queen once again took her side. "Daughter, if Anelia does not kill this man, I will. He organized the abduction of Peter. He murdered entire families in the Lonely Meadows. He came into our territory and committed atrocities."

"But we have courts now, Mom! We have a system. This isn't how we do things. We can put him in prison for life. Please. Please don't do it. We aren't supposed to do things like that anymore. Remember? We have a system."

"A system for most cases, yes," the queen agreed—at least initially. But then she continued to speak. "In this case, Anelia is correct. We have suffered an injustice far too great to be settled in a courtroom. This man's actions demand blood. Anelia has stated it perfectly. And for that, I'm inclined to pardon any unlawful actions she's taken today. Including…" She sighed as she looked at the burned-out husks of the DEHVs Anelia had destroyed to stop Vaz's entourage. "…including things we will dare not speak of."

Anelia nodded graciously. "So, I have your permission, Your Majesty?"

"You do. But make it quick and clean."

Anelia again drew back her fist. She'd kill him with one powerful blow to the face. Or no. No, that wasn't satisfying. She wanted to shoot his brains out, just like she'd promised. Pushing him back down into a lying position, she drew her Ether Cannon. She pointed it so that the barrel was against his head. "How's it feel, scumbag?" she asked. And then she moved her finger so that it rested against the trigger.

Once again, she was interrupted.

"Anelia, please don't do that!" Adim shouted at her, running over. "You're the good guy. He's the bad guy! No! No!" He began grabbing at her arm.

Gods dammit.

"Adim, honey, go wait with Kalana and close your eyes."

"No, please, don't do it."

"Yeah, don't do it!" Peter said, adding his voice to the fray. He ran over and joined his buddy, and now he was grabbing at her other arm, only with a bit more strength. Not a ton, but enough for anyone to realize that he wasn't level-1.

Now, Anelia hesitated. She knew she couldn't do this in front of Adim. This meant that, with her broken foot, she needed to drag him into the nearest woods or something and get it done where the little ones couldn't see. What a hassle.

Witnessing this, Queen Vayra sighed and approached more closely. She then leaned in and began whispering into Anelia's ear. "Worry not, Anelia. I'll take care of it later. Hand him over to my Elves, and I give you my word that this filth does not survive the day."

Reluctantly, Anelia nodded in agreement. Speaking aloud, she said, "You're right, boys. Killing is wrong. I don't know what I was thinking. I just missed you both so much."

Getting off Vazzal, she tried to stand up—and then almost fell over. But Adim and Pete held her up, and she ended up wrapping her arms around them both. Queen Vayra snapped her fingers. "Can we get a healer to fix this woman's foot? She's high enough level that she does not require the stones."

"On it!" one of the Elves replied. The boys set her down on the road in a seated position, and then a pair of glowing-green hands began pressing into her ankle, and at once, relief started to flood into her.

The queen then moved over to her daughter, whose eyes were still puffy from her crying. "I hear you took quite the hit, daughter."

Kalana nodded. "It hurt so badly, Mom."

She hugged Kalana. "I'm so sorry. I should've been here sooner."

"It's okay. At least now I finally know what Zach must've felt when it happened to him."

"Who did this to you?"

As though subconsciously wishing to speak for herself, the sound of a cough came from behind one of the DEHVs. There, the black-garbed form of Shadow was on her belly, her face planted into the concrete. She began to shake and convulse, spitting out blood and entering into a death rattle.

"Sh-she's still alive!" Kalana exclaimed, running over to her.

At the same time, a sense of absolute malice entered the eyes of Trelvor and Seiley, and both of them ran over as well. "I'll kill her with my own two hands!" Trelvor roared.

"Not if I strangle her first," Seiley added.

Kalana spun around and extended her arms wide. The stupid girl was actually protecting the assassin. "No! Nah-uh! Get away. Both of you. That's an order!"

"It's not my order," the queen added, a scowl on her face as she waltzed over and joined the three of them. "This one definitely dies. By my hand alone." She drew her gladius. "Show me the face of this contemptible human filth. Show me the face of the bitch who dared slice off my daughter's hands. I want to see who—"

Kalana flipped her over, and the Queen gasped, pulled back, and then shook. "W-what is the meaning of this?"

"She's an Elf, Mom!"

"But how?" Queen Vayra asked, perplexed.

Kalana, continuing to assume a protective posture, said, "If you kill her, we're never gonna know."

Despite being so close to death, the woman, Shadow, managed to push her face up off the ground so that she rested on the concrete on her chin. "F-fuh-fuck you," she said, blood oozing from practically every orifice. "Kill me…filthy…filthy Elves. Hate you."

Queen Vayra frowned. "Who are you?"

"F…Fuck you! Dirty Elf. Disgusting Elf!"

"You are an Elf!"

She shook her head and then passed out. Kalana then began pleading with her mother to heal her and spare her life. "Please," Kalana begged. "Please. Mom, we need to know who she is. She's one of us."

"She doesn't seem to believe so. But I am intrigued. Very well. Take this one alive." She glanced behind herself at Vazzal Shelen, who was in the process of being arrested with high-level handcuffs that would require far more strength than he had to break out of. "And make sure that one is taken to the 'other' holding cell. The one downtown."

"Nah-uh!" Kalana blurted out, storming over to her mother with her brand new pointer finger raised.

The Elf tending to Anelia nodded, and Anelia, carefully, rose back to her feet. Her foot was healed, and she found she was able to walk with ease. And now, she listened in as Kalana and her mother began viciously arguing with one another about where Vazzal Shelen should be taken. At the same time, an Elf approached her and asked her to remove all her armor and hand over her Ether Cannons.

"Why the fuck would I do that?" she demanded.

The Elf made an apologetic bow of his head and then said, "You have an existing deal with the queen, do you not? You aren't supposed to be in possession of armor or weapons. You're supposed to be retired."

"Try to take my guns and see what happens to you, Elf. Fuckin' try it. I'm in a bad mood and—"

"Anelia," Adim moaned. "Stop being mean to the Elves."

Anelia tamped down on her temper. To the Elf, she said, "If I had obeyed your rules, you would've lost Peter."

"I understand, Miss Hellcrest, but nevertheless, those are the terms you agreed to in exchange for leniency. You're fortunate the queen is overlooking your current breach of the agreement."

"But this is my last set of gear," Anelia lied, having hidden several more sets in various places. Still, she wasn't about to willingly give up another. "If I lost this, I'd be defenseless."

The Elf insisted, and Anelia, angrily, complied.

She could only imagine how upset Kalana would be if she ever found Anelia's secret armory.