The trek through the forest took more time than I care to admit. I was lost, heady with pain, and overall just in rough shape. So I wandered around aimlessly for hours.

  I was attacked a couple times, but none of the monsters held any particularly notable qualities. Just some foxes and the occasional wolf. Nothing special. But they did add to my considerable wounds a couple of times. And even though I was a higher level than them, it took a long while before the wounds started healing.

  And then there were the tears.

  The tears were an unavoidable consequence of the Tears of the Night, as they were in its very name. I had them on occasion, whenever I entered a shadow dark enough. They were quite annoying. Dark as pitch and as elusive as mercury, they streamed down my face in small quantities leaving streaks of fluid blackness on my face that I couldn’t fully remove. They burned like smoldering coals trailing motes of fire down my face and spreading to my hands whenever I wiped at them.

  My moonsickness wasn’t a problem anymore, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t become one in the future. I could feel the moon in the back of my head constantly trying to steer me on the nearest path to chaos. But my mind wasn’t compromised anymore, so that was something.

  I also noticed that the further away from the town I got, the quieter the forest became. Animals, even monsters, fled me at the very sight, terrified of my curses. There were different monsters out here, too. I never got a good look at any of them, but they were there, flitting among the shadows of the forest where the darkness was deepest.

  The light also began behaving oddly. It began to have shading patterns like a regular forest, then the darkness deepened even further until everything under the forest became gray-scale from the scant sunbeams. Even further in, the darkness started almost physically pressing against me.

  It was at that moment that I saw the fire in the distance.

  I nearly didn’t see it. Fire was so out of place here that I almost missed the warm flickers, thinking my mind was playing tricks on me. But no, it was real, and it split the darkness with a light blinding to my dilated eyes.

  That gave me something to aim towards, and I weaved my way towards it through the wandering trees. In some ways, I had gotten lucky that there wasn’t a tree blocking my line of sight that I would blunder into. But there were much worse problems in the darkness than missing a fire. There were roots that would trip me, branches that would cut me, and the thing lurking out in the darkness.

  A long, wailing scream warbled out of the darkness and haunted my ears for long seconds. The sound was a bone-chilling, inhuman thing that tore at the heart and ears. It spoke of a beast out in the darkness; a beast with teeth like razors and jagged claws designed for tearing through flesh. A monster among monsters.

  Was it really too much to hope that for once I might meet a fluffy unicorn that danced along rainbows with a soft coat and a cheerful complexion? Of course, the unicorn would end up wanting to tear out my lower intestines, but I found that just a little less intimidating than the thought of some bloodthirsty goblin out there wanting to make my skull into the next link for its belt.

  A thing stepped out of the shadows. That was all I could think to call it: a thing. It was the height of a man with toothpick arms twice as long as they should be ending in nine inch long, sharp claws. Its legs were too thin, and its feet were gnarled and the toes ended in short knives for toenails. But its face was the worst part about it.

  The eyes were sunken, hollow things that looked dried out and shriveled. They had a jaundiced yellow glint to them in the uncertain firelight. Its teeth were all pointed and wicked sharp, dripping putrid saliva that stank of spoiled meat. It had no ears or nose, just holes where they should be, and its jaw was slightly extended out of its face.

  The monster’s body was covered in a fine layer of hoary hairs that grew thick and tangled about the head and feet. Dead and rotting leaves crowned its shaggy head and dried blood coated its whole body over. Most of the blood flaked off in pieces, but some of it was still fresh and dripping down its arms and off of those knives it had in place of claws.

  I identified the thing, and what I found scared me more than the appearance did.

  An Dreores(Lvl 7)

  Literally translated “One of Blood,” this terror hunts the darkness between in search of its prey. The natives call it the screaming devil, due to its unnatural screams during the hunt. This thing is built to kill. With arms longer than the full bodies of most creatures, and claws designed to slit throats, carve through bone, and sunder steel, this killer can rip anything it comes across to shreds in seconds. Worse, the claws carry a strong anticoagulant, so even minor wounds can prove fatal if not tended to in time. Its saliva is also mildly toxic, though it contains neurotoxins built to slowly paralyze its target.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  I did not like that description. Everything about this An Dreores was nightmarish in the extreme, and I did not want anything to do with it. Alas, I didn’t have any choice in the matter. And seeing as I wasn’t going to be able to outrun the thing in the darkness around me, I would have to fight.

  Sizing up the enemy in front of me, I looked for any critical weak points. There weren’t many that I could see. Maybe the arms and legs could be considered such, though I wasn’t certain. They were basically just bone, tendon, and the token muscles to help move them, but if that was any indicator, they could probably move fast as a whip crack.

  The An Dreores sized me up in turn. It wasn’t used to its prey facing it down, and it wasn’t entirely sure of what to do in this situation. But it eventually made up its mind to just fight and see where that left it.

  There was a tension in the air of the kind you wouldn’t find anywhere else but the battlefield or the dueling grounds. It was the slow, heavy inevitability of death. One or the other would leave alive, but not both.

  Then we charged.

  I was fast. Really fast. But even my Olympic sprint was sluggish in comparison to the An Dreores’. It blitzed across the intervening distance like a squirrel racing for safety in the nearest tree. Only, this wasn’t a squirrel, and it wasn’t rushing for safety. It was out for blood.

  It got to me first, as its reach was longer. A long arm tipped with five knives flashed up and across, tearing at my shirt and scratching the skin underneath. But it didn’t do any worse damage. I ignored it and closed in, leaping forward over a sharp kick from the thing and crashing into its midsection. But the thing was strong. It bucked and heaved, and I only just managed to get a solid punch to its jaw in before it flung me off and sent me tumbling backward.

  It was on me in a flash, arms blurring down at me. And despite being mildly disoriented, I managed to jerk myself out of the way and roll to a crouch.

  But it was already on me, driving me back with sheer speed and razor sharp claws. It tore a gash through my already ruined shoulder, causing blood to spurt out. This only frenzied it more and it moved faster.

  If only I had my shield with me, I could have gotten in close. The shield would have been ruined, but I could have survived an extra hit and made one in return. But the shield was lying somewhere back in the rubble of the ravaged town, back where Dalia was. And I really didn’t want to have to deal with her for the next day or so. I would have to eventually, though.

  Distracted by my thoughts, even though I was in a life or death situation, I didn’t see the blow coming. It swept in from my left and drew a jagged gash across my shoulder and down to my hip on the opposite side. Small bits of organs oozed their way out of the wound, and an end of an intestine popped out, waving in the air and spilling whatever foul contents it had in it out onto the ground.

  At first I felt nothing. But after the shock wore off, pain flared icy hot, causing cramps to clench my tattered stomach muscles and squeeze out more bits of innards and droplets of blood. It wasn’t bleeding much, thankfully.

  And where there was one, there were others. I started taking more blows as I stumbled back, gasping. They were light, but they added up and soon I was bleeding profusely all down my left side. I wasn’t going to be able to fight for much longer.

  I was going to die.

  Then a miracle happened. An arrow struck the creature through the shoulder. It yelped and turned to find a girl standing about fifty feet away in the direction of the fire. She held a bow in her hand, not particularly high powered or special. In fact, it was a recurve bow that probably didn’t give more than sixty pounds draw-weight. But that didn’t seem to matter, as she was already in the process of nocking yet another arrow to the string.

  Her arrow had gone straight through its shoulder, and I saw it ended in a leaf-shaped broadhead designed to cause as much damage as possible on the way in and on the way out. It was an exquisite design, all things considered.

  The An Dreores, however, did not appreciate the craftsmanship of such a weapon. It only felt the pain and saw the cause. Only this registered in its single-minded train of thought: kill the offender. And so it charged the girl.

  Before it reached her it was intercepted by a pair of men holding a two-handed longsword and a short-sword and shield respectively. They positioned themselves in its path and settled into crouches, bracing themselves for the shock of the An Dreores’ impact against their bodies. They were successful, too. They managed to rebuff the creature and make it stumble backwards, off balance. But the two of them made no move to capitalize on its momentary weakness.

  It let out a long, warbling, unearthly shriek seeming to come from the throats of a thousand terrible things at once, throwing its head back and snarling at the heavens. Then it charged again, swinging its claws like scythes. They battered away the swords and threw the shieldbearer backwards. It spun and lashed out at the swordsman, catching him in the meat of the thigh and throwing him back as well.

  Then another arrow buried in its arm. The thing was lucky, as the arrow was aimed for its chest, so it wasn’t wounded grievously, but the pain snapped it back to its original target.

  A claw blurred forward and snapped the bow, sending it springing back into the girl’s face, then the creature leaped forward and buried its teeth into her neck. She cried out in anguish, then went limp as the neurotoxins spread their way through her body. Her eyes widened in shock and fear, and she fell backwards to the grass and needle-littered earth of the forest floor.

  The creature lifted its arm to strike one final time, and I realized with a little twinge inside of me that I was about to witness my very first human death in the dungeon. It struck a discordant string inside my heart, something that I hadn’t felt in a very, very long time: pain.

  Not the sort of pain you feel in the day to day life when you stub your toe or get your arm broken. No, this was a much deeper sort of pain; a pain I didn’t even know I had ever experienced until that moment.

  I watched as the clawed arm began to fall, powerless to do anything about it except watch and wait my turn to die.

  Then I blinked.