“Brittany? Britt, honey. What are you doing?” Gary froze, the smug smile vanishing as he saw his loving wife in chains.

  “Stopping this madness,” Elena shrieked, her whole body trembling. “You’ve gone too far, Gary!”

  “Baby, I understand you’re upset, but now isn’t a great time. Please, just take the chain off mommy’s neck and bring her back inside. I’ll come get you once I’ve dealt with the traitors,” Gary pleaded.

  “No! They aren’t traitors. They’re my friends! Either you let them go… let everyone go, or I kill Amy,” Elena screamed.

  Unbridled rage leaked through the mask of fear for just a moment as he bellowed, “That’s not her name!”

  “I know! Baby, I know. I’m Melissa. Your doting wife, who you love more than anyone, right?” Amy begged, choking as Elena tugged on the chain. “More than your whore daughter, right? She’s lost it, Gary. Just kill her, and we can go home.”

  “How dare you talk about my daughter that way!”

  “Think about your son! Do you want Connor to grow up without a mother because his sister went psycho?” Amy cried.

  “I’ll punish her myself once all this is over. Brittany, go home,” Gary growled.

  “No! Let me make myself clear. Either you and Connor leave, or Amy dies. Sneak them both to the portal, and you can come get your revenge once we’re all back on Earth.”

  Harvey watched in stunned silence, unable to comprehend the scene in front of him. Elena, his tiny, soft, scared art prodigy, was putting her life on the line for him.

  Run. You have to run!

  Why would she risk her future for him? A man who wouldn’t stand up and fight for his own? Every fiber of his being was paralyzed by fear, and his mind had accepted that letting it end quickly was better than fighting back.

  She was scared, too. Terrified. He’d felt it poisoning her aura for weeks like a cancer slowly eating through her will to live, yet there she was. Shaking like a leaf, but standing up to the executioner holding the axe over his head.

  Not begging. Demanding that the tyrant leave Veils End for good.

  “You could never hurt your mother,” Gary snarled.

  “Watch me,” Elena barked.

  Electricity erupted from the chain, arcing between the links before burrowing into Amy’s skin. Her perfectly styled hair shot straight up, the hairspray Gary bought with stolen merit going up in smoke as lightning bounced between billowing strands. Screams of agony filled the air as her body crumpled to the floor, but Elena stood firm, fierce determination in her kind eyes.

  “Nooo!” Gary screamed, moving toward Elena, then froze when she tightened the chain. “Please! Please stop, I’m begging you!”

  “Not a step closer!” Elena sobbed, the sparking abating for a moment.

  Gary fell to his knees, sobbing as he stared at his unconscious wife. Elena knelt behind her and pointed the tip of her wand at her forehead. Harvey nearly screamed when Julian yanked him into the forge.

  “Quick, let’s get your armor on while he’s distracted,” he whispered.

  “What?” Harvey began.

  “Hurry!” Julian urged. “She’s giving us a chance to fight back. Don’t waste it!”

  Piece by piece appeared from his slipsack, and the two worked furiously to strap it on as quietly as they could. Harvey’s hands, violently shaking, didn’t help, so Julian slapped them away and did it all himself while Harvey listened.

  “Is… is she breathing?” Gary sobbed.

  “She’s alive, but she won’t be if you don’t walk out of town right now. You planned on abandoning the Veilstriders all along, so why not get it over with?”

  “Honey, they can’t win. They can’t keep you safe. That’s all I want, Brittany, to not lose you again.”

  “What if I… I go with you. The four of us can leave for the portal right now,” Elena asked.

  Harvey lurched forward, but Julian pushed him back. “She’s buying time! Put your damn armor on so we can kill that bastard!”

  Harvey’s Stain told him they had no chance even with the armor, but he chose to trust Julian’s instincts instead of his own. They were more reliable.

  “Sweetie… I can’t do that. I can’t get you home knowing they’re out there, getting stronger. Plotting against me… against us. Our family.”

  “I can get Harvey to promise not to follow us,” Elena begged.

  “No, I won’t leave any loose ends. That’s how you died the last time. I showed mercy on some brat only to have his whole gang tie you up and burn the house down around you.”

  “That’s how Brittany died, Gary. I’m not Brittany. My name is Elena. A 17-year-old girl from Las Vegas who never met you until that first night in the trial.”

  “I know you think that, but it’s just not true. Why else would the System put you in my path if it wasn’t a test? A quest to get my family back. A woman the same age as my wife, and two hopeless kids that needed a father to save them,” Gary ranted.

  “I already have a dad, and he’s nothing like you. The System didn’t put me in your path any more than it put Hannah in Julian’s,” Hannah groaned.

  “Don’t say that, honey. I know you were meant to be mine. You’ll see. We have to reach the portal, and your true memories will return. I’ll be strong enough to get us there once I’ve killed the rest.”

  Gary stood up, wiping the dirt from his hands and knees before grabbing his sword. His aura crushed down on them once more, making it feel like they were standing at the bottom of the ocean.

  “No!” Elena screamed, the chain flaring to life once more as the desperate screams resumed. His armor finally secure, Harvey entered the doorway to see a flash of essence erupt from Elena’s wand. Time seemed to stop as it exploded against Amy’s head, carving right through the skull to send blood and brain matter splattering outward.

  Gary let out a blood-curdling scream as light radiated from Elena’s weave. A class level?

  Amy was really dead.

  Harvey didn’t have time to think about it as he finally charged out of the smithy, anger finally overwhelming the steady stream of panic flooding his weave. Seeing him appear, Elena scrambled away. Gary rushed to kneel beside his dead wife, only to have a massive spectral hammer slam down on his back.

  If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  Harvey pushed Innovator’s Arsenal to its limit, conjuring a weapon four times the size of his own. The impact sent Gary sprawling over the corpse, and the sickening crack of bones filled the air. Harvey smashed down again, the battery runes of his spectral hammer glowing brighter with every swing. Gary endured two more before rolling to his back and catching the hammer with his meaty palms.

  “I’m sorry, Melissa,” he whispered as a torrent of blood rushed out of Amy’s body and into his mouth.

  The bones Harvey crunched had been hers, leaving her body looking more like a lumpy bag of flesh than the beautiful woman she used to be. Gary wasn’t unscathed, but the bruises and broken bones healed in front of his eyes as her blood was turned to fuel for his rage.

  Raising the spectral hammer high, Harvey unleashed the stored energy and used his skill to overcharge the inscription, pouring every ounce of power from the ink, essence, and steel itself into the lightning burst array. Using it like this would damage the weapon and destroy the inscription, but that didn’t matter when the spectral weapon would disappear anyway. It was one of the benefits of Innovator’s Arsenal, letting him bring the full force of his weaponry to bear without worrying about damaging it.

  Using the skill like this required almost a third of his essence, but the explosion was worth it.

  Boom!

  Deafening thunder kicked up a wall of dust as Gary was bathed in a sea of lightning. Harvey blinked rapidly to try to clear his eyes, only to see him bracing both hands and feet to hold back the hammer.

  Like a cockroach.

  Harvey watched his body spasm as lightning burrowed into him, until the overcharge inscription finally broke the construct, like shattered glass that rapidly dissolved.

  Wasting no time, Julian leapt over the man, righteous flames burning away the dust in the air. His body continued to swell until he was twice his normal size, a massive foot stomping on Gary’s chest as one of Hannah’s arrows embedded into his thigh with a wet thud. Julian’s sword came crashing down towards Gary’s throat, but a cannonball of blood knocked him over before he could deliver the killing blow.

  “Rahh!” Gary screamed, absorbing more of the blood floating where he’d killed Christian and Dr. Silva. “You think you can kill me? You think you can turn my daughter against me? I’m gonna rip your bones from your body, Harvey!”

  Harvey ducked behind his shield just as a glimmering shard of blood crashed into it. It was razor thin, but still packed enough to punch through his dampening array before it could absorb all the force. Keeping his head covered, he charged forward, his warhammer trailing behind him as fangburner covered his shield.

  Gary’s sword came crashing in, easily breaking through the stony barrier to release the forgefire trapped underneath. Heat billowed outwards, the smell of singed beard hair filling the air around them. Gary just chuckled.

  “That's all you got, Scoutmaster?”

  “Nope,” Harvey grunted, reeling back to punch the bottom edge of his shield towards Gary’s neck. A second, weaker burst of lightning coursed through the man, but he just laughed louder.

  “The first one hurt, but that barely tickled. I’m too strong, Harvey!”

  A gently glowing arrow thudded into his neck.

  “Quit talking and fight!” Hannah yelled, sending a third towards his head. Gary nimbly ducked back, the arrow sailing past him into the crumbling wall of the bank.

  “Have it your way,” Gary snickered before pooling the rest of the blood floating beside him into a massive projectile that streaked towards Buttercup. One of his glowing antlers snapped as a radiant shield instantly surrounded them, slowing the blood down before it popped. Hannah sputtered as her face was stained red, and a fury Harvey had never seen ignited in her eyes.

  Julian leapt to his feet and sent his own shield clanging off Gary’s thick skull, Emberheart flames covering his entire body. Gary swiped back with a vicious slash, crimson energy extending the blade to carve a deep gash in the steel covering Julian’s left shoulder. It pushed him back, but it wasn’t enough to break through. Julian responded with a slash of his own, but Gary’s superior dexterity helped him trade a deep gash in his neck for a thin cut across his chest.

  Standing on opposite sides of the rabid man, Harvey and Julian fought him two-on-one. Fire and lightning engulfed the empty dirt road as Flamestrikes, Shield Slams, and Lightning Burst Arrays erupted one after another. They tried to overwhelm him with essence, but Gary refused to be caged in.

  Brutal slashes and blood magic carved into their armor, until the blade finally found a joint and poked a hole in Harvey. Exposed, his own blood began rushing into Gary’s open mouth. The wound was small, a shallow cut on his armpit, but it felt like he’d become an orange someone was trying to juice through a needle hole.

  He felt a battle of wills erupt like when he was making ink, but instead of opposing natures ripping each other apart, it was a battle over who controlled his own blood.

  Harvey might call his weave the inky veins that carry his essence, but his blood had nothing to do with moving or storing essence. Instead, it carried him. Who he was. What he believed. His will to reshape the world.

  That was why it was the key piece of every batch of ink. His blood, like his body, carried the mark of his path. And right now, it was being stolen.

  “Harvey!” Elena yelled, appearing in the crowd of Veilstriders idly watching the battle. “Don’t be afraid! He can only drink you if you let him!”

  “Gag her!” Gary screamed. When nobody moved to comply, he sent a wave of Harvey’s blood to decapitate another Veilstrider. Nigel, the British magician who had saved countless lives by distracting enemies and extracting injured Veilstriders, tumbled to the ground. His head rolled to Master Sueng-Ho’s feet, terrified eyes staring up at him as blood seeped into the air.

  The taekwondo master leapt into the air, his foot glowing gold as a devastating head-kick distracted Gary from leeching Harvey.

  Free of the agonizing pull of Gary’s Will, Harvey fought to suppress his Stain as he resumed swinging. Wild rage consumed the Outpost, not a single soul holding back as they fought to eat Gary alive.

  A flurry of kicks sent the man reeling until a blade of blood severed a leg at the knee. Screaming in pain, Seung-Ho was dragged out of the fray, only for Hyrum to take his place. Muscles swelling with multiple layered boosting skills, he sent a devastating uppercut towards Gary’s chin. The blood tyrant caught air, and Julian’s massive frame heaved to toss him even higher before he used Heroic Leap to send them both careening into the sky. Finally having a clear shot, Hannah released one of the crystal arrows of her Critical Mass skill. It was the weakest version, only requiring five consecutive hits to charge, but that was the best she could string together through the chaos. The arrow embedded in his arm, the explosion tearing his flesh until his left arm dangled limply from strips of muscle and bone at his side.

  Julian wasn’t left unscathed, but his armor had absorbed most of the explosion. Still holding onto Gary’s body, he took a brutal swing at the injured arm and severed it completely, the flames of his firebreak mantle instantly cauterizing the amputation. Shoving the screaming man higher, Julian landed with a burst of healing fire.

  Using every last drop of essence in his body, Harvey conjured another spectral hammer. He’d never been great at baseball, but rage and adrenaline helped him catch the falling man with a brutal overhead swing. The ground shook as hammer and tyrant created a small crater in the road, once again filling the air with dust as Veils End waited with bated breath.

  “Is he dead? Tell me he’s dead,” Julian gasped, his body shrinking as his essence reserves ran dry, no longer able to sustain his Burning Resolve skill.

  Harvey waited, but no kill notification appeared. Instead, a roiling wave of his murderous aura radiated out from Gary like the shockwave after an explosion. Every drop of blood floating around them surged towards Gary’s lifeless body alongside streams stolen from every open wound he had caused. Harvey recoiled as his vitality was ripped from his grasp once more, and instinct screamed that stepping closer meant putting more blood on the sacrificial altar. He could hear the man gurgling as the need for oxygen and life force struggled to decide which should flood down his throat first, but he was too drained of essence and busy fighting off the parasitic aura to follow up on his strike.

  “He survived? You've got to be kidding me,” Harvey wheezed.

  "Group up! Protect each other!" Julian shouted.

  Hannah readied an arrow and waited for a shadow to appear from the haze while the army of Veilstriders slowly backed away from the expanding dust cloud. A razor wave of sword energy cut a wide arc, slamming into the defensive line of armored veilstriders who'd taken the vanguard. It was an attack meant to disrupt instead of kill, but it still managed to knock a few of the weaker warriors off their feet.

  Everyone waited for the follow-up, but were surprised when none came. Instead, they saw the severed arm lying in the middle of the road, with its previous owner ducking into an alleyway.

  “Don’t you run from me!” Hannah bellowed, Buttercup surging after him alongside a few more Veilstriders who hadn’t already exhausted themselves. Harvey tried to follow, but was instead caught by a sobbing Elena.

  “I have to help,” he began, exhaustion overcoming him once more.

  “She’ll be fine. Just stay with me. Please,” Elena begged.

  “You’ve done enough, Harvey. Be on guard in case he comes back,” Julian agreed.

  Harvey knew his friend was tapped out, too, but he didn’t have the energy left to protest. “O-ok. Thanks, Julian.”

  Stumbling towards the smithy, he tipped a health potion down his throat. The sweet strawberry taste erased his wounds, but the sensation of having his life force stolen away remained. Luckily, the Stain was blissfully quiet, letting him rest his back against the doorframe as he sat on the small, raised porch.

  Sitting beside him, Elena wrapped her arms around his neck and wept. He felt her body shudder with every breath, but she held onto him with a death grip.

  “I can’t believe you’re alive,” she sobbed.

  “All because of you,” he choked.