When I woke, too many things vied for my attention at the same time. The first thing I focused on was the pungent smell of rotten fish and a spice I’d never smelled before. Whatever the spice was, it burnt the hairs in my nose. The smell was so overpowering that it felt like someone injected a drop of reven sap directly into my brain, and my eyes snapped open. Which unfortunately meant the rest of my senses came awake as well.

  Fresh torment greeted me. Pain radiated from my leg with the rapid pulse of my heart, and I almost passed out again. Mustering my will, I tried to look down, but a wall of notifications blocked my vision.

  Congratulations! Through your efforts you have leveled the [Grove Guard] class to level four!

  +2 Constitution +1 Strength +1 Aura +1 Free Point Awarded!

  Congratulations! Through your efforts you have leveled the [Grove Guard] class to level five!

  +2 Constitution +1 Strength +1 Aura +1 Free Point Awarded!

  Congratulations! Through your efforts you have leveled the [Grove Guard] class to level six!

  +2 Constitution +1 Strength +1 Aura +1 Free Point Awarded!

  Congratulations! Through your efforts you have leveled the [Grove Guard] class to level seven!

  +2 Constitution +1 Strength +1 Aura +1 Free Point Awarded.

  Congratulations! Application in battle has leveled The Willow’s Wrath skill to (25/25)!}

  Congratulations! Through your efforts you have mastered The Willow’s Wrath general skill!

  +3 Endurance +2 Dexterity +2 Strength awarded!

  You have one class and two general skill slots available; would you like to browse the available skills?

  [Yes/No]

  I focused and chose no. The sensation of that many attributes at once flowed through me. My very soul undulated and convulsed as the System enhanced my flesh and aura alike. When I’d read the messages, I hoped that my increases to Constitution and Endurance would help heal my injury. Instead, it felt as if the wound grew in strength alongside me. The pain redoubling with every new attribute. I cried out in fresh agony as my tendons and nerves grew stronger and more sensitive, redoubling their ability to flood me with pain.

  Maggie said something, but I ignored it and tried to ride the wave of pain. To accept it and move on. Deliberately I focused on the fact the System deemed me a master of the Willow’s Wrath skill.

  I hadn’t even reached twenty, and I’d mastered a combat style designed by a demi-goddess! I was now one of two masters in the skill. Of course, there could be more who’ve mastered it.

  The System could have integrated the skill into other classes, but until proven otherwise, I was going to call myself the only mortal master of the Willow’s Wrath.

  I focused on that idea and tried to bask in the accomplishment, tried to force the pain out with pride. It worked, partially. The pain remained but lessened as I fantasized about what I would do with the skill. Just because I’d mastered the System version didn’t mean I couldn’t improve it further.

  To do so required me to elevate and improve the style myself. If I made a significant difference, the System itself would reach out to me through a notification and ask if I wanted to resubmit the skill. That exact thing happened when Iona developed the style. If I accepted, the System would reward me with the Title {System Contributor}. It was the only known way to guarantee you’d get a Title.

  When I finally felt in control enough to open my eyes again, it was to the sight of Maggie. She smiled down at me with concern while she passed a burning bundle of herbs under my nose.

  “Hey Bran, nice of you to finally wake up.” She laughed, concern laced her face.

  “Hamstring’s cut, moderate blood loss.” I said, letting my head fall back again.

  Growing up, we’d been taught the basics of human anatomy. That way, if something ever happened in the field, like blacking out from pain, we’d be able to tell our squad mates what was wrong with us. Maggie’s features softened, and she reached out to grab my shoulder

  “I know. I re-bandaged your leg while you were out. The little one did a number on you, huh?”

  Looking down, I saw my leg wrapped with a floral-patterned piece that was probably once a bedsheet. Layers of gauze peeked out from the edges. Splinted by two polearms with their heads broken off, my leg raised by my pack, the tablets removed. I was unsure if you were supposed to splint a leg when the tendons were cut, but I had a hard time imagining it could make it any worse.

  “What’s the process for getting this healed out on the plains?” I asked, unwilling to wait the six months this would take to heal naturally.

  “The Guild will do it for you, free of charge.” Maggie said, no small amount of pride in her voice.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Really?”

  “Apprentices get free healing. Y’all are at the most dangerous point in your careers right now. Fresh enough that you’re full of vigor and bravery, and weak enough that you’re still easy to kill. If we didn’t heal you green helms, I doubt half the apprentices would survive to journeyman.”

  Green helms was a new term. I could figure it out from context, however, and made a note never to paint my helmet green outside the forest.

  “I just have to get to the Hall and they’ll heal me?” I asked.

  “Usually, you’d have to wait for an appointment to be free, but I’ll pull a couple of strings and we can get you healed as soon as we get back.”

  “The others?”

  “Ellen’s alright, couple of cuts, but she’s okay otherwise. Mika’s got a nasty headache from the backlash of having one of his golems destroyed. Nora’s okay, but she came really close to having her body metabolize itself for mana there at the end. It’ll be a couple of days before she can cast again, even after she gets healed.”

  I felt a brief spike of anger and worry at what Nora had done to herself, but overall, I was just glad everyone wasn’t seriously hurt.

  “Alright big guy, enough moping. Let’s get you up.” Maggie said and stood, careful to set down the smoldering bundle of herbs away from the wooden wall.

  My leg spiked in pain again and I would have collapsed, but truthfully, Maggie was carrying me more than she was helping me walk. Her Strength made my body weight a non-issue, even if my size made it awkward.

  We shambled down the walkway to one of the offices we hadn’t reached before things went to the Hells. She paused at the doorway, the name Hardbuckle engraved into the oaken door, and spoke in a quiet voice.

  “I’m proud of you, Bran. Things could have gone badly if it wasn’t for you. The others might not realize how much trouble they were in, but I do, and I want you to know how proud of you I am.”

  It was silly how happy her words made me. I’d barely know this woman a month, but even with that, being a sentinel was something I’d trained for my entire life. It was a damn good feeling to hear I’d done my duty.

  Maggie opened the door with one hand and led me into a remarkably clean room where the others quietly rested and chatted with one another. Maggie was right. Out of the three, Nora was in visibly the worst shape, pale and bloodless. Bags had rapidly developed under her eyes and she looked like she’d missed a week’s worth of sleep in an evening. When Maggie set me down, it was on the immaculately made bed Nora sat on, her head lowered.

  Like I’d done before, I gave Nora a small shoulder bump. Barely enough to rock her, but enough to let her know I was beside her. She looked up and gave me a strained smile.

  “Thanks.” She whispered and bumped me back.

  “Alright guys. We’ll go over what happened once we get you all to the Guild Hall and healed. But for right now, I want you all to get some rest. Sleep, chat, whatever, just rest. You’ve all had a hell of a day.” Maggie said, her voice brooked no argument, and she turned to leave.

  “Before you go.” Ellen called out. “There’s something here. The band members were hiding something.”

  “Oh? How do you figure?”

  “The way they fought. It doesn’t make sense otherwise. They had every chance to escape once they hamstrung Bran, but none of them did.”

  Maggie nodded in agreement, like Ellen had correctly answered a test question.

  “Whatever they’re hiding, y’all can find it tomorrow. Ah, Bran and Nora, here.”

  Maggie tossed a small green pill the size of my fingernail at each of us. I caught mine, but Nora missed hers and I had to grab it before it rolled under the bed.

  “It’s for the pain. It’s got no real healing property, so you don’t have to worry about mutation, but it should help you fall asleep.”

  “Thank you.” Nora said, beating me to it.

  “No problem.”

  “What about us?” Ellen asked teasingly.

  “Get yourselves maimed or nearly crippled and I’ll give you one.” Maggie returned with a smile.

  She left after that, closing the door behind her, leaving a timed candle as the only light in the room. Ten minutes later and I felt the effect of the painkiller settle over me like a mantel. I’d gone down smoother than other medicines I’d taken and didn’t leave an aftertaste. It didn’t take long for the pain to recede into a dull throb and I gave into the call of sleep joyously.

  ~~~***~~~

  When I woke up, it was in a communal pile that must have formed after I drifted to sleep. Draped across my chest, Nora left a slight bit of drool trailing from her lip to my side. A snuggled-up Mika and Ellen, who held each other close, covered her legs in return. Looking down, I noticed that even though my leg throbbed with pain, everyone had been careful to avoid touching it.

  I’d woken up in piles like this before, both after drunken festival nights and after long days in the Emerald Ocean. I was not about to deny the comfort I took in everyone’s presence, especially not after yesterday, so I settled deeper into the bed and tried to get comfortable.

  At first, I tried to get back to sleep, but none of the techniques I knew worked, so I tried to meditate and activate my last unmastered skill. When I came back out of meditation, the first thing I saw was Maggie seated next to our pile, a buckler and short spear across her lap. Her posture and the casual alertness she carried reminded me of an equarrel matriarch watching over her litter.

  “You just wake up from a skill?” She whispered to me, careful not to risk waking the others.

  “No.” I whispered, but Nora stirred with the rumble of my chest before she settled back down. “Couldn’t get calm enough to activate it.”

  “Not surprised.” She said with a gentle smile.

  Maggie let us lapse into silence for a while and I took the time to soak in the warmth of this moment, to glory in the Renewal after last night’s Decay and Stagnation.

  “Hey, does the Cult of Weeping Grace have any legends around the Trainers?”

  “Not really. We’re taught that they’re all aspects of the System given form. What about you guys?”

  “Empire doctrine is that each Trainer is a saint who’s ascended to Mera’s divine realm.”

  I thought abut that for a second, given how vast the System was and how flexible the Divine could be, I had no doubt that both theories were true in some fashion.

  “Who do you guys think the martial Trainer is?” I asked.

  “Which one?”

  I should have thought of that. I gave her a brief description of the Trainer I’d met in all of my skills so far. Blocky, finely carved crystal, a crown of jagged diamond capped his featureless face.

  “Ah, that’d be Saint Claudius Favre.”

  “What’d he do to ascend?”

  “Before the empire was unified, Saint Favre was the one to mediate between, and conquer, all the tribes and petty kingdoms for the first royal dynasty. When the [First Emperor] ascended to the throne, he was his closest [Advisor] until Favre was killed during peace talks with one of the kingdoms to the West. The stories never say which one, just that Favre died in peace talks with ‘the enemy’.”

  I had nothing of worth to add to that, so I just let the conversation lapse into shockingly comfortable silence.

  I glanced down at my still sleeping party mates only to see Nora awake and listening to Maggie and me talk. When she saw me looking at her, she flushed and smiled apologetically, like she’d done something wrong. To assuage her, I smiled back and tapped her on the shoulder.

  The room rested in a comfortable silence for another hour before Maggie decided we’d had enough rest and called for us to get up. Ellen and Mika were the only ones still asleep, but when they woke and noticed how they’d slept, they scrambled away from each other like they were on fire. Furious crimson blushes accosted both their cheeks.

  Nora was next to get up, and while she wasn’t slow, she wasn’t in nearly as much a hurry as the other two were. Once Nora was off my chest I tried to rise, some pain fighting through the haze of the painkiller, but Maggie put a stop to the attempt before it really began.

  With the same ease as the last time, she picked me up in a side carry. It was awkward with the size difference but it allowed me to retain some dignity which I was grateful for. With a twist of mana, Maggie extracted two crutches from her storage ring. Both were well padded with leather and made to be adjustable for height. She held me up while I got comfortable in them and stepped back once I had them under me.

  “C’mon guys!” Maggie said as she spun on a heel and left. “This is the best part!”

  The corpses were gone from the warehouse catwalk and floor when we exited the room. Gore still drenched the room, red stains and puddles of blood caked the floor and sections of the catwalk still dripped. Laid out in two neat lines before the stairs were twenty-eight sets of equipment.

  The sight was creepy. I’d been maimed for this victory and was braced for the sight of a battle hard won. To see all twenty-eight members of the Ivory Band reduced to nothing but sets of organized loot sent a small shiver up my spine.

  My discomfort didn’t mean I couldn’t recognize the act for the small display of mercy it was. Three-quarters of the party had never faced death, at least not on this scale, before; there was no guarantee to how they’d handle it if we’d had to collect the trophies of our bounty personally. I tried to hide my discomfort at the sight, but Maggie still caught my slight cringe and gave me a smile that asked, ‘what can you do?’

  Ellen had no such compunctions.

  “Eerie.”

  “Too much?” Maggie asked. Her tone made it suggested it was more of a statement than a question.

  “Yeah.” Mika hesitantly confirmed for her.