Vel ducked to the ground, as if that would save her from the arrow that flew faster than she could possibly move. The arrow thudded, and something heavy hit Vel. She gasped as she felt something sharp sneak its way under the pauldron at her shoulder, not that she thought the leather armor would do much anyways.

  [Iridescent Hide level 4]

  A shape formed before Vel, a man with his sword through her shoulder. Despite the arrow in his back, he grinned.

  “An honor, [sacrifice]!” his hissed, giving a sickening show of teeth as he twisted the blade in her shoulder.

  Grimacing, Vel bit her tongue, refusing to release a cry at the hot pain that radiated from her shoulder, across her chest, and stinging down her arm. However, when he ripped it free, she couldn’t help it as her voice defied her, screeching out over sharp pain she felt from the blade that dragged through muscle and bone.

  “I’ll be the one to kill you!” he cackled.

  The blade slid free, finally, and what Vel thought might have been a relief was torture. It was like her shoulder couldn’t hold itself in place anymore, dropping flat against the uneven ground she was pressed against. Flatter than it should have been. While the blood felt warm against her skin, the wound itself felt cold.

  [Iridescent Hide level 5]

  Holding his sword above her head, Velmira stared past the tip at the man. There was something that stirred deep inside her, something more than the defiant child that escaped that temple back in Evamyn. She batted the tip of the sword aside with the dagger she still held, and just when she thought she’d nail the man in the face with a fireball, an arrow protruded from his neck.

  As his body slumped over her, Vel grunted.

  I had . . . wanted to kill him, she momentarily recognized, something that came with other realizations. While her shoulder ached beneath the weight of a fully armored behemoth, energy fled her like her very blood did. These men didn’t want to just kill her, it was an honor to do so. They were so twisted that they thought her death would be a good thing, and likely even more twisted for whatever the church promised them if they succeeded.

  Each church knight wanted her blood.

  Vehemently growling, Vel shoved at the heavy body over her. She cried out in sheer rage at the man when he hardly budged. Frustrating! She was just so weak still!

  “Vel!” Sigurd called, his footsteps heavy as he closed in on her. He ripped the man off of her like he was nothing. It was almost as if the man wasn’t plated at all by the way Sigurd so easily rolled him aside. Then the hunter pressed his hands against Vel’s wound, her pain sharp down to her fingertips. She grimaced.

  “I’m still bleeding, Sigurd,” she said, and as if in response, he applied more pressure.

  Vel gritted her teeth.

  “Aden!” Sigurd called, searching about. “Where did he go?”

  “I don’t know.” Vel flicked her eyes to Amalia as she emerged from the underbrush. She crouched down, blinking. “By the gods, Vel, your shoulder is . . .”

  Sigurd shook his head. “Aden can fix it, we just have to find him.”

  “He ran off after one of the [spear masters] lost his hand,” Amalia said. “These spearmen are not as trained as the church knights, it seems, and . . .”

  “It’s not their fault,” Sigurd said, and quickly looked about. “There’s a second illusionist. The man that almost got Vel was invisible.”

  “Yeah,” Vel said through clenched teeth. You better damn well be telling me how you saw him, she thought, but couldn’t utter the words. While the adrenaline had been high during her imminent death, now she could feel it crashing. The wound was worse than she thought it was, wasn’t it?

  “How did he miss?” Amalia asked.

  “Because I could see him,” Sigurd replied.

  “How?” Amalia beckoned.

  “The space around them is distorted. Slightly. It’s easier to tell here━more obstacles to distort, but out in the open . . .”

  “Still, shouldn’t we have been able to tell when we were creeping around the place?” Amalia asked.

  “Is that really important?” Velmira hissed out, grunting.

  Then an angel crawled out from beneath a massive leaf, that was if angels had dirt all over their faces, wore clothes that looked too big, and wore a crazed smile beneath sandy blond hair. “Hey Vel,” Aden said, “how’s that shoulder.”

  Vel would have rolled her eyes if she wasn’t feeling like her shoulder was going to collapse for a second time beneath the pressure Sigurd was applying.

  Aden motioned for Sigurd to move, and he did, allowing Aden in to work his magic. The teenager’s smile faded as he focused, holding his hands over her wound. Feeling bones, muscle, and tissue straighten out was unnerving, even under the soothing powers that Aden’s magic provided. Once everything was back in place, her skin knitted together, Velmira thanked Sandy, then pushed herself up to a crouched position.

  She cringed at the wide bloodstain in the dirt, but she wasn’t about to let a drop of her own spilt blood scare her, not now.

  “Likely,” she started, “the second illusionist is in front of the temple then, isn’t he?” she asked.

  “He could even be inside, looking out from those windows,” Amalia suggested.

  “No,” Sigurd shook his head. “We’re too far in the jungle for that to be a viable option. Too many brambles to see through. He needs to be on the ground. What we should assume, at the very least, is that more knights are positioned in front of the temple.”

  Vel nodded, moving aside leaves to see the temple’s doors. “Why aren’t they coming towards us now? If they’re invisible, we should be as good as dead already,” she asked.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “Because they’re easier to spot,” Sigurd said.

  “An entire squadron of [spear masters] didn’t see them in the jungle,” Amalia noted.

  “That’s because they didn’t know what to look for,” Aden said, a smile on his face all over again. Was he just . . . happy to heal? While the teenager didn’t make a lot of sense to Vel right now, she decided those were questions for later.

  “Kid’s right,” Sigurd nodded. He took a big breath, then turned, meeting Vel’s eyes.

  She stared back at him, almost seeing his thoughts behind those hazel orbs. “So?” she prodded.

  “Do you have any steam or smoke skills? Any search skills?” he asked.

  Vel raised her brow. “I have [keen eye] and [radial search],” she answered, and looking back towards the temple, she focused, squinting.

  [Keen Eye level 12]

  There was the slightest shifting in the brick patterns directly in front of the temple, and she guessed it to be the outline of someone’s head. However, she struggled to see much else. At least she got the level for it, she supposed.

  Sighing, she considered how [radial search] was used, and most importantly, the cost. If she had to guess, it would be something with her mind, maybe a headache, much like the one that was coming on now. Blinking, Vel felt herself reaching out, like a sixth sense that brushed past trees. It did nothing more than report obstacles back to her, and the radius was abysmal. It didn’t even reach outside of her immediate area, let alone past the jungle’s edge.

  [Radial Search level 2]

  “Unless I can level it quickly, [radial search] won’t be of much use,” Vel said, shaking her head. “If I get close enough, I could point out invisible obstacles.”

  “That might be better than nothing, but we take the risk that, if one of those is a [ranger], we might not be breathing by the time we leave this jungle.”

  “Then we need ta bring ‘em inside these woods,” Aden said.

  Vel frowned, staring as the shadow of the trees grew, gradually stretching over the space in front of temple. Then an idea occurred to her. “If I can use [radial search] while in the shadow realm, then I might be able to find out just how many there are and where they are.”

  Sigurd cringed. “And its cost?”

  “Dizziness,” Vel answered.

  “How many acuity points?” Sigurd asked.

  Vel briefly scanned her stats.

  [Stats]

  [Strength: 4.5]

  [Dexterity: 6]

  [Constitution: 3]

  [Acuity: 5]

  [Magic: 6.5]

  “Five,” she said. “I can do it.”

  Sigurd took a deep breath, his nostrils flaring as he brow lowered. “Fine,” he said, his face making it clear that he didn’t like it.

  But before she got up, Amalia grabbed her arm. “Wait, if they had a ranger, and that’s what we’re worried about, why haven’t they shot any arrows yet?”

  Sigurd furrowed his brow. “Hm,” he hummed.

  “Don’t really change the plan, don’t it?” Aden asked.

  Vel shook her head. She stood up, and as she walked towards the temple, toe, heel, toe . . . she fell.

  [Feather Foot level 11]

  Plummeting in the shadow realm was still unnerving, but she was ready for it, landing on her feet with a light touch of [feather fall]. Light dappled the place like spears, enough that it would be difficult to navigate through.

  Looking at the glassy ground, Vel saw Sigurd, Amalia, and Aden waiting, quiet and nervous as they looked towards the area she needed to move towards.

  Vel stepped around a spear of light, then another, having to frequently pause.

  [Shadow Sneak level 24]

  [Shadow Sneak level 25]

  [Shadow Sneak level 26]

  By the time she stepped beyond the underbrush, she was starting to feel a sense of vertigo, a dizziness setting in. Despite it, she pushed forward, pausing only once she reached a spot that would be impossible to cross without some forethought.

  The gaps between the spears of light were tight, barely big enough for her to get around. If she went around the entire section, she could circumvent the risk. So, moving around it . . . further. Further. It stretched on.

  [Shadow Sneak level 27]

  By this point, she had to stop entirely. Standing completely still, she looked up and away from the ground, staring up at an abyss of darkness as she hoped the dizziness would pass. Swaying momentarily on her feet, she closed her eyes, doing her best to center herself.

  Keep going, just a little further, she thought.

  Opening her eyes, some of the dizziness subsiding, she glared at the countless spears before her. Taking a deep breath, she made the first step past two of them, sucking in her stomach, as if that would be the issue. After she was past those two, she stopped, a third directly in front of her. She stepped around it, slow and methodical as she glanced at two other lights that threatened her presence.

  Taking an awkward step to the side, Vel paused with one spear in front of her, and once directly behind her. It was terrifyingly close to her nose, enough that she didn’t dare glance elsewhere.

  [Shadow Sneak level 28]

  Just push through, she thought, feeling a droplet of sweat roll down her brow. She shimmied, inching her way free of the light spears. Then she found herself in the center of those two she’d passed, and three others.

  There was enough space for her to risk looking down, and as she did, she felt that vertigo return in full force. Stiffening, she did her best to ground herself as she looked at the sky below her, along with nearing stone walls.

  Tilting her head, she looked up towards the black abyss, and despite her stiffness, she felt herself swaying regardless. Closing her eyes, she reached out, as if mentally trying to imagine the space around her.

  [Radial Search level 3]

  As she did this, she could quite literally sense the spears of light, as if they were obstacles, much like the trees. However, that was all she could sense, that was until she realized her elbow made contact with one of the light spears.

  Her stomach dropped, and Vel gasped, falling from the shadow realm and straight to her knees in the center of seven obstacles.

  [Radial Search level 4]

  “Sigurd!” she screamed, hearing the heavy steps approaching her from all sides. Armor clinked, and swords sang as they were unsheathed. They were getting closer, each one, despite being invisible, becoming more precise as she kept up [radial search]. Her head ached with a vengeance, and . . . and . . .

  [Radial Search level 5]

  “There!” she pointed to the nearest one, just barely seeing the distortion of the trees behind him as he raised something high into the sky. A sword.

  [Keen Eye level 13]

  Vel dropped her dagger, drawing the sword at her hip, barely batting away the incoming sword. Her [radial search] couldn’t pick up on something as nuanced as the weapon but [keen eye] could. The sword returned for a counter, and as Vel desperately tried to block from her vulnerable position. It was hard to keep a grip on the weapon as it was batted aside.

  As his sword closed in on her, Vel heard a guttural cry from in front of her as an arrow flew by, and the man’s mirage faded. He thudded to the ground, holding the front of his neck. Sigurd’s arrow had grazed him just barely enough.

  Enough for me, she thought, running into the opening as she felt the obstacles behind her running after her.

  [Radial Search level 6]

  Just as she leapt away, Velmira felt something sharp swipe down her back. Her eyes widened as her legs collapsed beneath her before the rest of her body went with it.

  [Tough Hide level 62]

  [Iridescent Hide level 5]

  Vel hit the ground hard, her cheek scraping as it hit the stone.

  [Iridescent Hide level 6]

  Her form shook, and when she tried to move her legs, they didn’t obey her command. Even flexing her fingers felt like agony.

  I can’t . . . I can’t hardly move, she thought.