Crashing out onto the other side of the rift, Leo scrambled to his feet, nearly dropping his longsword in the process. Escaping through the rift would only buy him a few seconds at most as the far more powerful agents of the Planar Lords would be forced to decide how they wanted to dampen their souls in order to chase after him. It wasn’t a lot of time, but he would take whatever he could get. Turning every which way, Leo took in his new surroundings.

  This new plane was dim and gloomy, without much natural light penetrating the dark purple clouds drifting by overhead. The ground looked dead and rotten, and there was an almost ever-present fog slowly drifting along the surface, making everything hazy and difficult to make out. There were large, crooked trees here and there, each one growing out of small pools of bubbling liquid that smelled so bad Leo nearly threw up as the wind wafted the scent over to him. At the very least, he didn’t see any magical beasts prowling around just yet, which meant he was free to focus his attention on the agents chasing after him rather than being torn to shreds by the natural denizens of the plane.

  With no time to come up with anything better, Leo triggered Dash and ran over to one of the nearby trees. Not the closest one, but the one that had the largest pool of foul liquid bubbling around it. At the last second, he leapt, using his momentum to hurdle over the liquid and smash into the bottom of the tree. He nearly blacked out and fell back into the liquid when the impact sent a jagged stab of pain through his ruined ribcage, but he managed to hold on through sheer willpower if nothing else.

  Unfortunately, the sudden pain did cause him to drop his stolen sword, which vanished into bubbling liquid with a disgusting ‘plop.’

  Cursing his bad luck, Leo put the loss of his only weapon behind him as he focused on the task at hand. Using every trick he could remember from the many years spent climbing trees back in the forest of his home plane, he scurried up the dead tree, climbing as high as he could possibly go. There weren’t any leaves to hide him, but so long as he pressed his body as flat as he could against the trunk of the misshapen tree, the combination of poor lighting and hazy fog just might be enough to hide him from wandering eyes. While he could see a bit more clearly thanks to the fog thinning the higher up he climbed, his pursuers should be right in the thick of it down on the ground.

  Leo barely managed to get into position before the first of his pursuers popped out of the rift. A second, and then a third quickly followed, and he held his breath as he watched them step forward and look around. Each of the three wore sharp uniforms with the symbol of the Nexus shining proudly on their chests, leaving no room for doubt as to who they worked for.

  “Damn it, of course he’d run off into a poison-filled wasteland,” a man with a waxed mustache said, looking disgusted as he refused to move more than a few feet from the rift. “The Lords aren’t going to like this.”

  “They’re going to like it even less if we come back and tell them we gave up without even trying to find him,” a woman hissed, her eyes glowing bright white as she triggered some unknown skill. Leo pressed himself even harder against the bark of the tree, wishing he had some sort of stealth skill he could rely on.

  “Anything?” the third agent asked. He was a man with an incredibly powerful build who practically radiated authority. And based on the giant maul strapped across his back, Leo had no doubt he was not only the leader, but the primary muscle of the group.

  “Just hold on a second, this is my weakest investigative skill,” the woman snapped, her bright gaze scanning the ground all around the rift. “Lousy tier 10 plane… Stupid soul dampening…”

  “Sounds like someone’s still upset they were demoted after their mess up the other week,” mustache joked, laughing at the bright white glare that was shot his way. “Hey, don’t take your anger out on me! You’re the one who missed there being a secret rift at the bottom of the lake! You were brought along for one reason, and you screwed up! It’s only fair you’re the one who needs to try and fix things.”

  Leo’s heart seemed to stop for a moment and he nearly lost his grip on the tree as mustache’s words rang in his ears. A secret rift at the bottom of the lake? That could only mean one thing…

  These agents, or at least the one with the glowing eyes, had been there.

  She was one of the ones responsible for killing his father and destroying his plane.

  “I’d like to see you try and pick out a submerged rift from a distance when your soul is dampened to a pathetic rank 5,” the woman snapped, forgetting all about her hunt for Leo as she thrust a finger into mustache’s chest. “Even here in a tier 10 world I feel like there’s a mountain sitting on my chest. I have no idea what possessed those two to settle down in a plane where they couldn’t even take a full breath, but I can only assume they’re either insane or masochists.”

  “We can ask when we actually find the one that got away,” the third agent said, frowning at the other two. “Would you two get back to looking for our target? Or would you prefer being sent after her instead?”

  Twin full-body shivers swept through the fighting agents, and they quickly shook their heads.

  “No thanks, I choose life,” mustache said, finally stepping away from the rift and crouching down to look at the ground. “I’ve heard what those two are capable of when their souls aren’t dampened. Fire Maw and the Frozen Killer… Word is she froze the entire surface of a miniscule plane once, just because she was too lazy to go out and hunt dinner. How did she get away from you guys anyway? Weren’t you part of the team that ambushed her?”

  “She’s the Frozen Killer,” the maul-wielder said bluntly, as if that was answer enough.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “I heard the Raider Lord made the mistake of sending one of his Chosen after her for encroaching on his territory a few years back,” the woman with the glowing eyes said. “Didn’t she get a medal for killing the Chosen without receiving so much as a scratch?”

  “Watch your tongue,” the maul-wielder snapped, causing her to jump as if she only just realized what she’d said. “You know as well as I do that referring to that maniac by that title will get you punished by the Planar Lords.”

  “Yeah, well, if the Planar Lords were truly omniscient and could listen in on us all the way out here, they wouldn’t need us running around carrying out their dirty work, now would they?” she muttered, none too quietly.

  While glowing eyes and mustache kept searching, and the man with the giant maul stood watch, Leo remained hidden up in his tree, his heart pounding as his very soul fought desperately against his mind.

  They killed dad! They destroyed my plane! Leo’s entire body shook and his nails bled as he scratched against the rough bark of the tree. They’re here! Right in front of me! Yet as much as he wanted to throw himself from his hiding place and try to rip them apart with his bare hands, he knew it would be just about the stupidest thing he could do.

  Pain lanced through his side with every breath he took, and he pressed his forehead hard against the tree, scrunching his eyes shut as he took a few slow, deep breaths. Using that very pain to clear his head, Leo stopped himself from doing anything stupid.

  If he were in pristine condition… If he’d still had an actual weapon on hand… He still wouldn’t have stood a chance against a single one of these three agents. Even if they hadn’t been wearing uniforms that indicated their status as agents of the Planar Lords, which meant they were undoubtedly skilled fighters, it was clear from their conversations that they also had far stronger souls than he did. Sure, they were forced to dampen them in order to chase him into this plane, but it sounded as if they were only dampened to rank 10. That was still four whole ranks above his own soul, which was way too high of a difference to try and make up with grit and rage.

  Strengthening one’s soul also strengthened their physical body to a degree, regardless of any skills one had within their core. And that wasn’t even factoring in the various evolutions they would have experienced already to go along with their high soul ranks. He’d be lucky to land even a single hit on any one of the three agents in a one-on-one battle as he was. In a three–on-one? They’d tear him apart.

  “I think I got something,” glowing eyes said, staring intently at the ground outside the rift. “This fog isn’t doing my low-grade skill any favors, but I got his tracks. Looks like he barely hesitated before running off.”

  “No wonder. This poisonous fog is already giving me a stomach ache,” mustache remarked, rubbing at his gut. “He probably hoped he’d be able to get clear of it.”

  “Stop complaining. The fog would take longer than that to set in,” maul said, nodding toward glowing eyes to continue. “Where did he go?”

  “From the looks of things… he triggered his Dash skill and ran off this way,” she said, following the exact path Leo had taken. As she approached the bottom of his hiding place with the two other agents in tow, Leo tried to remain as still as possible, ignoring how his head was slowly beginning to hurt from how hard he was pressing himself into the tree.

  “He came this way… he tried to jump over the poisonous pool…” she paused, squinting at the bottom of the tree, her glowing eyes blinking. “...and he smashed into the trunk. I think. The fumes from the pool are mixing with the fog itself. I can barely make anything out.”

  “It’s been just over a week, and he was all on his own, so he’s what, rank 4 at this point? Based on the fact that he has Dash at least,” mustache said, peering down into the bubbling pool. “The poison probably would have done him in almost immediately. Unless of course he-”

  “Stand back,” the maul-wielder ordered, his powerful voice so certain of his own authority that Leo almost found himself trying to take a step back as well, only saved by his own arms wrapped around the tree physically preventing him from doing so. Without giving the other two a chance to even follow his order, the maul-wielder crouched down and plunged a muscular arm into the bubbling pool, causing the other agents to gasp as they jumped back.

  “Are you nuts?!” glowing eyes hissed. “With your soul dampened, that poison-”

  The man yanked his arm out of the pool, holding a dripping longsword in his grasp. Tossing it onto the ground, he shook the foul liquid off his arm as he clicked his tongue.

  “Acidic… and fast-acting at that. Any organic matter, even a rank 4 body, would probably have completely dissolved by now. The gem they wanted us to secure was in a wooden box, wasn’t it?”

  “Yeah… They definitely mentioned a wooden box,” mustache said, suddenly sounding scared. “So that means-”

  “That means we get to go back and tell the Planar Lords ourselves that not only did we fail to secure Fire Maw and the Frozen Killer’s son, the unique gem that those two found is no more.”

  The three were silent for a moment as they shared a look between them that Leo could only think of as equal parts concern and mourning. The longer they waited, the more his head began to hurt, and he grit his teeth as he tried to mentally will them to give up and go away.

  “Well, if the Planar Lords are going to punish us regardless, I see no point in forcing myself to suffer in this stifling, poison-filled plane any longer,” the woman said, the light in her eyes winking out as she shook her head and headed back to the rift. “This isn’t my fault, that’s all I’m saying! I’m just here for investigation and tracking, physically catching him was supposed to be your guys’ job!”

  “It was a tier 8 plane, what was I supposed to do?” mustache whined, chasing after her. “Come on, it’s not like they can demote you again, right? Take one for the team here!”

  The two of them argued all the way back to the rift, vanishing once more as they warped back to the previous plane.

  Only the maul-wielder remained.

  The large man stood there for a few seconds, still staring at the base of the tree as if lost in thought. After a moment, he crouched down, looking more closely at the fallen longsword. Leo squeezed his eyes shut, hoping beyond hope that the man would simply turn and follow his comrades back out of the plane. He almost prayed to the Planar Lords instinctively, only catching himself at the last second. Refusing to pray to the ones who destroyed his whole plane and upended his life, but not knowing who to pray to instead, he simply stood there, hugging the top of a tree like his life depended on it as his ribs and head ached.

  Finally, after what felt like far too long, the last agent stood up. Without so much as a backwards glance at the tree or sword, he walked over to the rift, stepped into it, and vanished from sight.

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