[Skill Rune]

  [Shadow Arrow][Uncommon]—An Archer cannot always rely on his quiver. Allow an Archer to weave an arrow from shadow, briefly borrowing it, replacing it with light. Shadow Arrow power depends on how much shadow is borrowed during the drawing phase.

  Name: Suna Amor

  Level: 50

  Class: [Flintwind Archer]

  Rune: 127 → 131

  Feat: 23

  Mana: 28750/28750

  Pyre Flame: 82146 → 81816.

  Pact: 2

  Class Skill (14/35)

  - Archer Instinct [Uncommon]

  - Gale Backstep [Uncommon]

  - Moving Shot [Uncommon]

  - Flint Draw [Uncommon]

  - Arcane String [Uncommon]

  - Gale Bow [Rare]

  - Spell String Mastery [Rare]

  - Hissing Volley [Rare]

  - Drill Arrow [Uncommon]

  - Still Form [Uncommon]

  - Saproot Arrow [Rare]

  - Emberwind Arrow [Rare]

  - Ashen Brand [Uncommon]

  - Nil’s Wind [Rare]

  - Shadow Arrow [Uncommon]

  General Skill (12/35)

  - Swift Draw [Uncommon]

  - Drowfication I [Rare]

  - Rune Seeker [Uncommon]

  - Gale Step [Uncommon]

  - Wind Veil [Uncommon]

  - Thermal instinct [Uncommon]

  - Enchanced Sense [Uncommon]

  - Enduring Body [Uncommon]

  - Battle Focus [Common]

  - Eagle Eyes [Uncommon]

  - Pyre Shield [Rare]

  - Pyre Flame Starter [Uncommon]

  Strength: 2246 → 2276

  Dexterity: 1572 → 1602

  Vitality: 1498 → 1526

  Arcanery: 2875

  Sense: 1052

  “Good one?” Noa asked.

  They stood at the entrance of the fortress, a wide double gate that had been opened by the time they arrived. Suna looked back to see more Tieflings streaming around in the last preparations before the charge.

  “Not sure, mind if I shut off Emberwind for a bit?” Suna asked.

  “Eyebag, this is hardly the time!” Reki chastised him, craning his head and pointing toward the dark hallway of the fortress. “We’re about to charge.”

  “I beg to differ,” Wendy said. The Lunarian stared Reki down with her superior height. Wendy had finally finished questioning the Tieflings, and she had had enough truth, according to her. “This is the last time he can.”

  “Look, we should preserve—”

  Suna shut down his Emberwind, to Reki’s growl. They were suddenly cloaked in eerie darkness with weak torches as the last flickering light. The open gate let out a slight breeze like a breathing beast. Suna calmly summoned his Gale Bow and drew the new Shadow Arrow. He could not see it, not like this. But he felt a moving, shimmering energy around his fingertip. And beneath his feet, there was light that shone in a small circle.

  He eyed the Shadow Arrow, which was now visible and completely dark compared to Emberwind; it was just so… calm, like midnight.

  His Archer Instinct told him to grow it, so Suna did. He poured in more Mana, and the light around his feet grew larger until it hit Wendy and Reki, who almost stepped back into the shadows in surprise.

  Noa, on the other hand, entered the circle of light and scratched his burnt cheek. “It gets more powerful the more shadow it consumes?” he asked.

  Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  His Shadow Arrow grew bigger, and it started to vibrate, and its inky texture began to coil around Suna’s hand.

  “Maybe,” he mumbled, wishing he had more time to test. But time was one thing they were badly in need of.

  His spirit ear twitched, sensing an enemy up ahead.

  “Incoming!” Suna shouted. Noa moved instantly with Reki in tow. Wind caressed past him, fluttering his cloak. The Runebearer blitzed forward.

  In the fraction of a second, five cloaked Undead stormed out from the gate, aiming straight at Suna. However, five blades met them, blocking their daggers mid-air. As they landed, Noa slammed his shield onto one, and Reki smashed his spell hammer into another head, exploding the Undead in blood.

  Wendy stood beside Suna, her eyes searching, and one Undead Assassin made it through the Tieflings straight at him. An invisible shield was erected, clashing with the Undead. Suna could see its face as it rebounded. Perfect, he could test his arrow.

  The Undead, despite being blocked, still managed to get one hand under its cloak and threw a dagger at Suna.

  He took a step back, meant to dodge, but then the shadow around his arm rattled. It rebelled against his body and disintegrated in a small, fireless explosion, which sent wind drafting around them.

  The dagger’s momentum died, and it was knocked into the air.

  Regaining his focus, Suna moved forward. The Undead Assassin tried to reach for the dagger; however, Suna managed to reach for it first. It attempted to pivot and bled to the ground, but Suna jabbed the dagger into its throat before the magic took place.

  He then wove an Emberwind, revealing the assassins still fighting to the naked eye around them, and gorged the spell arrow through the undead's open mouth in molten sizzle.

  [You Have Slain an Undead Assassin. Lvl 40]

  [Level Up]

  He turned to the battlefield; the Undead Assassin had taken the brief second of darkness and attacked them. That was his fault for not heeding Reki’s warning.

  “Everyone all right?” he shouted, only to see all the Undead Assassins had been taken down in a flash. Six Runebearers had taken three down, while Reki killed one with Noa, who had reduced their speed with his defense.

  They had been doing this all right.

  “See? I told you!” Reki growled.

  “It's fine, Orator,” John the Runebearer said. “The Undead Assassin can read intent. I let the Archer do that because I knew we would bait some out since he didn’t know better.”

  “If that's the case, then you shouldn’t tell me that now,” Suna mumbled, realizing he’d just been used… This must be one of the tricks they used to farm these Assassins.

  “That is true, John,” Noa said, shrugging his heavy shield off the Undead’s throat. “We could’ve baited out more.”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t. But I like to prevent a fight between the Archer and the Orator,” John said. “Besides, we are ready to go. Amidela, I assume we have everyone now.”

  “Yes, Runebearer. Frontline!” Amidela shouted, and every Runebearer of the Third stepped forward, all twenty-five of them. “Advance!”

  Amidela led the group in, as the Tieflings bravely entered the darkness with a weak torch in her hand.

  “Hold on, shouldn’t Noa here be on the front?” Suna asked, but the Runebearers had already entered, and worse of all, a fluttering step echoed in front.

  “They’re running?”

  “We’re the second line. The Runebearer will clear any opponent beyond us to preserve what I determined to be our greatest fighting force: all four of you and me. I’m second only to Desha and James himself, so please rest assured,” John explained. Then he motioned behind them. “And the rest shall act as the third line to prevent any flanking force by the Assassins.”

  “Wait,” Wendy said, her purple eyes squinting at the Tieflings behind her, who all held a reluctant yet fierce posture as they clenched daggers that the Assassin dropped. “They’re only level three. Can they do it?”

  “This formation prioritizes speed; the situation calls for it. Just behind us will be the support formation that shall bring potions in case we need more,” John said.

  Wendy looked like she was about to complain, but the Lunarian nodded; the formation was a sound one.

  “One minute has passed. Let's go,” John said, the air of finality coming with it.

  Noa ran first, with Reki following behind, and John kept his distance between the two to act as a damage dealer.

  Suna sprinted after them, ensuring Wendy kept up with their pace.

  The Emberwind arrow shone in the large hallway as a sphere of light. Suna's eyes were keen on every pocket of darkness banished in front of Noa. Behind him and Wendy were the other Tieflings, their loud steps and strained breath betraying their struggle to keep up already; they must have been fighting hard.

  “Spiral staircase in front!” John shouted and took a turn, leading the small army into a wide open archway that no longer hugged the wall, exposing them to all directions.

  Ahead, flickering torchlight danced with the wind the Runebearers generated. The clank of steel resounded through the area, and the fight was a skillful spectacle as the Runebearers and Undead Assassins fought on a large spiral staircase that could fit all of them in a straight line.

  Not just ahead of them, but behind, a deafening scream echoed through the line.

  Wendy gasped and turned to see limbs and heads jump up as an Undead Assassin hit them from the rear.

  “They’re flanked!” Wendy shouted, hesitation filling her movement.

  “Keep going, Wendy,” Suna said, turning his attention ahead. Others might not have felt it, but he could. The Godknight was just two stairs above them. He had told them earlier, but to feel this overwhelming presence, and to sense it unmoving in place…sent tension through his body.

  “But,” she mumbled, yet she knew enough not to stop running.

  “Ahead!” John screamed. “We have won the stairs, keep going, this is all to save James and win the world! Fight!” The Runebearer shouted, not at the humans, but at the Tieflings who were massacred behind them. “Don’t let them pass!”

  A guttural roar of the Tieflings followed, and out of the Tiefling army behind them, only about three dozen broke through and ran after Suna and Wendy. Most of them were supporters protected by the warriors. The rest were now fighting beings more than ten times their level.

  They needed to kill the [Undead Godknight] fast.

  John, Noa, and Reki ascended the spiral staircase. Suna couldn’t help but look at the back of Noa and Reki.

  At their heads, especially.

  They did not even turn their heads. This new world had changed them; the instinct of survival had been ingrained inside them. He remembered when they saw him as mad for challenging the Drow tower alone, and that fact surely had changed now—now they truly accepted the new world, which was why their class had evolved, and Noa was already looking for his next class evolution.

  Which was why Suna could not stagger around—no, he needed to keep going. He tapped his feet; wind gathered, and he shot skyward.

  “Suna?” Wendy called as he blazed past her.

  He saw Reki and Noa, whose eyes both widened. In a brief second, Suna saw Reki shaking his head, and a small smile tugged at Noa’s lips. Like they’d been expecting this.

  “Welcome back!” Noa shouted with a small chuckle mixed in, letting out a childish whoop.

  Suna kicked downward and whirled up, taking over the first line of the Tieflings. He vaulted into the next floor, where he saw a barricade prepared by Undead, and there were those bulky-armored bodies like they had swallowed rock for dinner, two gigantic shields in each hand.

  A grin tugged his lips. How perfect.

  [Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 42]

  [Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 41]

  [Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 45]

  [Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 42]

  [Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 45]

  The Runebearers were about to meet them, and Suna could imagine how long these hulks would easily stall them.

  He trailed his finger down mid-air and weaved mana into Gale Bow, and with it drew Emberwind Arrow.

  Suna did another kick and lofted himself upward again. A red shimmering arrow gathered by his cheek, and the faltering-tailed fletching roared in expectation–with it his excitement rising as if he had just been freed from something that held him back with invisible chains.

  The Shieldnites barely turned; shadow flickered around their bodies, but it was too late.

  Suna blasted his Emberwind down, and it streaked, rocking the Shieldnites' formation into molten ashes. He did not waste any time; Suna rushed inside the smoke and banished it with a swipe of Gale Bow. What greeted him was the flailing dark ashes from the very bodies of the undeads that used to give him such a hard time.

  [You Have Slain Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 42]

  [You Have Slain Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 41]

  [You Have Slain Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 45]

  [You Have Slain Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 42]

  [You Have Slain Undead Shadow Shieldnite. Lvl 45]

  [Level up]

  [Skill Rune]

  [Skill Rune]

  [Strength Rune]

  [Strength Rune]

  [Vitality Rune]

  Patreon!