This wasn’t as stupid as it might immediately appear.

  During one of our breaks on the climb, we discussed just this possibility as a group. We had always known it was a possibility that we could run face-first into a battle such as this. The idea of immediately turning back and fleeing from it had been raised, but not seriously entertained. After all, not only had most of my companions joined the expedition for the Statusial gains they might accumulate, but there was no point in running. As Venix told us, in violence-on-violence battles, an Oni wasn’t going to target a regular mortal more than they would anyone else.

  Anyone and everything was free game out here. We didn’t rank higher on any imagined chart than a fellow Oni, to these battle-mad beasts.

  That didn’t mean we weren’t on the menu, however. It just meant we could wade into the melee to achieve our objective without being dogpiled by every single hungry monster on the mountain.

  We would fight our way to an advantageous point, and if a chance to advance through the range presented itself, we would take it. To do this, our plan was to skirt our way along the edges of the battlefield, slaying any and all that would oppose us along the way. Once we found a viable exit point that saw us forward, we would defend that point for as long as we possibly could before retreating out along it. This way, we could both advance in strength and make sure we were keeping time towards Gorenzan.

  Even if it was likely already flooded.

  Things were even going well. All of us, even Kazuma to a degree, were a cut above the rest when it came to classers in our weight class. It was a good thing, too, considering the sheer amount of Oni out here. All of us had our hands full, and needed to engage individual monsters one-on-one with the exception of Renauld. Kazuma was keeping to his self-imposed duty of protecting the Healer, while said Healer did his best to support us from behind. There was no room, time, or will to be relying on the small unit tactics we’d learned from the Oni Hunters back in Kawamara proper.

  There were just too many of them.

  Venix was in a class all to himself, hardly appearing as if he had lost any strength at all from his extended coma. In fact, now that I was much stronger than I had been the last time I’d seen him really cut loose, I would say the Antium samurai was beyond fully recovered.

  He was stronger than he had been. Any Oni that dared venture close to the Antium man was swiftly dealt with.

  Azarus was full on fighting with each of his chain blades extended, using them to hassle any Oni that dared step up to him. I saw each of those spears, as well as his hammer, grow white hot as he channeled some form of Skill to enhance his blows. It certainly had a pronounced effect, considering how his knives were cutting through Oni flesh like a hot knife through bricks of butter.

  Liora, on the other hand, was demonstrating abilities I’d never seen from the former assassin. I’d always been aware that she had similar abilities to our now passed commander, Hook. They both tended to favor razor-sharp, cutting winds, him on his old daggers, and her on her claws. But I’d never seen her coat her entire furry body with those blackened winds until it was hard to see her through the howling sheathe. In a glimpse, I saw her straight-up plow right through one particular Oni, pulping his torso and barreling right towards another.

  But it was Bella who surprised me the most. Where all of us were demonstrating all new abilities we’d likely either been workshopping or had gained through Statusial growth, it was my lover who showed an entirely new fighting style. The pirate Captain had always tended to fight with a form of storm element that buoyed her strength, agility, and more importantly her cutlass. But she’d abandoned that altogether.

  Now, she fought like a conductor.

  In some bizarre combination of what seemed both Skill and Spell, her cutlass was born aloft by a furious, blackened, electrified cloud. Instead of her holding the blade itself, it seemed to dart all across the battlefield directed by her will, to slash and cut at any Oni she so wished. More importantly, however, the blade of the cutlass itself seemed to have been surrounded with so much dense lightning that it appeared as if a bolt from heaven itself. The result was that the zooming blade left scorching rents in the flesh of all that it touched, charred black by the plasma-sheathed blade of the instrument. Still, for all of her newfound ability to direct her usual blade, she kept a new one ready. There was a dagger I’d never seen her draw before, a long, curved, wicked one akin to a serpent's tooth that she kept in a backhanded grip to ward off those that strayed too close. Waving one hand about to direct the blade, Bella winked at my momentarily startled expression, before getting back to work.

  All these new abilities…all these new strategies…

  They were a stark, albeit relieving reminder, that I wasn't the only one continuously growing in strength. My friends trained, and they pondered, and they grew just as much as I did, never sitting still, never growing complacent. For every victory that we had, the System doled out more strength, more levels, more new abilities for them to unleash on our foes. I wasn’t the only one to have trump cards hidden up my sleeves for emergencies.

  However…

  Not to brag, but I think mine was the most effective. As simple as it might seem, a single blade of scintillant fire was absolutely nothing to underestimate.

  I don’t think even Venix’s four blades parted Oni flesh as well as my sword-staff did. In the mere minutes of battle we’d engaged in, as we circled the battlefield, I had lost count of the number of Oni I’d cleaved in twain. One stroke of the burning blade was enough to end the life of even an elder Oni who thought to try their luck. It didn’t matter what defenses the more canny Oni tried to raise. The blade sundered through them all, fulfilling the prophecy of the Skill’s description.

  It struck the root of all things.

  But, there was a problem with using The Scintillant Blade in this way. It had an immediate downside that I’d discovered just after finding out I could do this, those months ago in a private Hinaga practice room.

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  This was the first instance I had found of a Skill draining Mana to keep active. And the drain was not small. Every second I had the fiery blade active huge chunks of the Mana I’d accumulated from every point I’d invested into Wisdom were being burned to keep it alive. Perhaps the most frustrating thing, though, was that I could just tell that was a problem with how I was using that Mana. It all came back to my problems in channeling the refined Aether. If I was more efficient, if I had an actual channeling method, then I don’t think it would be a problem. But I didn’t.

  It was deadly, yes, as evidenced by the dozens of Oni I’d cut down. However…

  I just couldn’t keep it going forever. If only because I needed to keep some strength in reserve for after this.

  After all, I didn’t know if I was going to be fighting a nascent Calamity later or not.

  That was the reason I didn’t dare to try and channel both Vis Maledicta Exactoris and Might of the Wyrdwood as well. Using both of those Skills at the same time placed tremendous physical stress on me. Even if those abilities didn’t tax my Mana to keep active, it would wipe me out for an extended period of time to try and utilize the multiplicative effect of the Skills together with this blade.

  Still, it was fine. The purpose of using the enhanced version of my most powerful Racial Talent in the first place was so we could establish ourselves on the field of battle. We had successfully navigated to the edge of the mountaintop and located a ridgeline that seemed to stretch further into the range. Now we were just holding our position here until, I believe, we were satisfied with the slaughter.

  Reluctantly I stepped back behind my allies briefly, and when I felt my internal reserves of Mana reach the half-way mark, I cut the Skill. Instantly, the coruscating fire wavered and vanished from the topaz core gem. Strangely, the stone steamed in the still-falling rain.

  I slung the staff back over my back, and instead drew both of my daggers in their unextended state, activating the less taxing form of The Scintillant Blade upon them as I did so. Stepping past Kazuma and exchanging a curt, acknowledging nod with him, I got back to work, engaging with a blue adolescent.

  As I fought, I felt like I was acting on auto-pilot and instinct. I no longer had the ability to fall into what I’d termed as a ‘battle trance’ like I’d discovered back in Elderwyck. I didn’t have the emotional numbing effect that my lost middle ring could grant. But I could almost equate it, these days. It was almost like…I had grown used to battle and could direct my full attention towards it.

  Turns out, that wasn’t a good thing.

  I don’t know if it was my focused state, if I just ended up being surprised, or if I just plain got cocky.

  But when a green elder wandered into the path I’d carved through the battlefield, I didn’t think of the most evident ability I’d seen from them. Stupidly, I caught its attention with a Poisonthorn Shot, since it seemed like it had caught sight of Kazuma and Renauld itself. I had thought I was doing them a favor by taking the focus away from our Healer, even if he had a guard. After all, I’d killed more than one elder here in this battle, one-on-one, and I was confident in myself.

  Instead, I came the closest to death I’d encountered since the close of the Elderwyck campaign.

  The green elder wheeled in my direction, dragging its broad hands through the air in a wide arc as it did so, almost as if it was slapping at me. From those palms issued a fierce, directed wind. A gale strong enough I thought it might have been able to knock down a tree.

  Much less a person.

  I went flying, soaring over the edge of the mountaintop I’d been fighting on top of, only moments ago.

  My transformed eyes widened, and it felt like my heart stopped briefly in my chest. The world seemed to slow around me, as a great abyss yawned underneath my floating form.

  In the split second before I descended over the edge, I was able to see the fight on the mountain in a freeze frame. Venix had dashed over to take care of the green elder that had dealt with me so effortlessly, and had, just as effortlessly, rent him limb from limb. A few of my companions seemed to have noticed my plight, and with a desperate expression on his normally stoic face, Azarus had directed his hovering chain spears to dart toward me. Presumably, he meant to catch my falling form with them. Alas, he wasn’t close enough to the edge, and didn’t seem to have the ability to grow enough chain that they would reach me. They stopped just before I could grab hold of them.

  The only other person that seemed to have noticed my plight was…

  Bella.

  My lover stopped cold in the middle of the battlefield to track my soaring form. Her lips parted in horror as I somehow, across the distance, met her stormy blue eyes. I only had moments to look into them.

  Hopefully, she could read the message in my own.

  Before I fell over the edge.

  ………………………….

  As I plunged down the mountainside, I was strangely calm. After all, if any one of us had to be thrown over the edge like this, I was glad it was me.

  I was the only one with wings, after all.

  Even as surprised as I was by the gust of wind, I had never lost my grip on Vis Maledicta Exactoris.

  Problem was, I had never actually learned how to fly with them. Sure, I’d done some enhanced jumps by flapping my wings down hard, but that was different. There was more to flight, true proper flight, than just mindlessly beating my batlike appendages. Flying was super complicated, and humanoid forms weren’t really meant for it.

  Still, I knew it was possible.

  I just wish I’d had the chance to learn how to fly in a less perilous situation.

  As the world roared around me, I oriented myself in midair until I was facing downward, plunging headfirst towards the raging mountain river I could see far below me, illuminated by flashes of lightning. Maybe it was my imagination, but I thought my falling speed picked up.

  Still, I didn’t open my wings. Not just yet. I probably only had one chance to get this right. If I messed this up, I was going to end up as a red smear on the side of the mountain, before finding a watery grave in a muddy stream bed.

  I held my breath as I felt the wind around me rush past, waiting for the right moment. I must have only been feet away from the stone when I felt it. A shift in the air, as the currents changed around me.

  Now!

  I snapped my wings open, and the speeding air caught underneath them.

  Instantly, I sailed up on them, zooming over the surface of the raging river below so closely I swore my feet skimmed it.

  But I wasn’t paying any attention to that. Instead, I was marveling at my own actions. A massive, manic smile stole across my fanged mouth.

  I was truly flying now.

  Experimentally, I flapped my wings, sending me flying higher into the air. I was momentarily startled by how easy that was. But in retrospect, my Core mused, that made sense. Even if I had stolen this Skill from a mostly dead Calamity, it made sense that the System would imbue it with at least a few instincts about how to properly fly.

  Relieved, I flapped more and more and more, until I was soaring ever higher. In moments, I had winged my way past the edge of the mountain I had just fallen past, until I had flown to hover far above it. Below me, I could see the whole of the battlefield. The sight of the small war stole the smile from my face.

  Because it didn’t seem to be going well, honestly. In the moments since I’d fallen, the board had changed.

  It looked to me like another violence had been drawn by the fighting, and fallen upon the remnants with glee. This time, they looked to be browns. My understanding of the Oni species told me they were earth-aligned, which meant I had to get down there now.

  My companions were surrounded by earth. The browns might be even deadlier than the greens were, on that stony mountain top.

  But something caught my eye before I could swoop down and join the battle. Something in the sky.

  It looked…

  Well, it almost looked like there was someone hovering up here other than me.