“You good, Selenne?” Kassan asked.

  “Yeah, I’ve been better,” Selenne groaned. She was sprawled out on the ground next to a dead Adler-Stern. Selenne’s ear was severed and her armor was smashed, cut down to the bone as the Adler-Stern’s blade had pierced her shoulder.

  I need to bandage this up, Selenne thought. But I’m too tired.

  Kassan’s voice grated on her (singular) ear. “If you’re good, we need to move. Guild is calling. Another saltslider was spotted.”

  “You mean froggy-snake.”

  “Saltslider.”

  Selenne hauled herself to her feet, grabbing her ear with her. A quick-bandage was produced by Kassan. A handy medical device from the guild that was more like tape than a bandage. Within a couple seconds she had taped herself up.

  She looked at the Adler-Stern girl, who was lying in a growing puddle of blood, pouring out of her neck, arm, and midsection. Good fight, Adler-Stern.

  Actually, wait. That looks like it won’t fix itself any time soon. Didn’t she say she had an important mission. Should I do something?

  Selenne fished into her pocket, pulling out a normal, regular bandage, about the size of her thumb. No point in using the fancy stuff.

  “Alright, let’s get back to work.”

  Kassan blinked, looking at the corpse on the ground. “Aren’t you gonna help your friend more?”

  “Friend?” Selenne looked down at the girl in question, who had a single bandage on her neck holding back the blood, despite her extreme blood loss and injuries. Not really. Just someone who’s strong, I suppose. Someone who doesn’t deserve to be wrapped up in all this.

  “Let’s just go,” Selenne said. “I already wasted enough time. My performance review isn’t going to look good.”

  Besides, I have nothing to get out of the Adler-Stern now. She said she would tell me about Lucian. Doesn’t have to be now. I’ll cash in when it’s best for me. I already know that he’s doing fine. If the Adler-Stern didn’t say anything out of the ordinary, he’s definitely okay.

  Am I being heartless? Selenne looked back at the Adler-Stern’s corpse as it slowly repaired itself. It wasn’t her she was thinking about, but Lucian. I could have called, texted. Earlier, I couldn’t, because the guild destroyed all communication devices and issued guild-monitored ones, but now that I’ve got a private phone again…

  Selenne shook her head. She couldn’t risk it. At any moment she could transfer her information from her old, destroyed phone to her new, encrypted one, but it was too much of a risk. Even having a phone separate from the guild-issued ones was a risk. Putting Lucian’s contact on it?

  The guild already knew of Lucian’s existence. This much was for sure. She knew that if the guild wanted background information about someone, there was no secret that could be held. But the guilds kept affiliated and non-affiliated separate. Selenne was already being as careful as she could, so hopefully if something happened to her nothing would happen to Lucian.

  So Kassan pointed out the way, and Selenne activated her boots, sliding across the salt flat in the direction of a froggy-snake. She put back on her helmet to prevent salt from entering her eyes. Back to work.

  …

  Viviana woke up facing the sun. And Bena.

  “Oh, you’re finally awake! Good morning, sleepyhead!”

  Viviana pulled herself up to her feet, looking around. Bena and Lucian and Thomas. The entire Landsknecht. They were uninjured. The sun was still high in the sky. Viviana looked down at her injuries. She wasn’t bleeding anymore. The only indication of injuries were the bloodstains on the salt below.

  She moved her hands, flexing her fingers back and forth to check her motor movements. Then she realized something. She had lost. Again. Shit. I can’t believe it.

  I gambled away our participation in the war. Sure, there was no contract. Sure, it was just a verbal agreement. Yet I don’t want to break it.

  Viviana sighed.

  “What happened to you?” Lucian asked.

  “Bumped into something. Fought. Nearly killed it. But I lost,” Viviana said, glancing at Lucian. He reminded her of Selenne. A painful memory, now.

  Selenen had made her request clear. Landsknecht would have to withdraw from war related missions from now on.

  ‘From now on,’ Viviana thought. She said ‘from now on’. Technically, we are already on a mission. We accepted the contracts a while ago.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  So we can at least do these missions we started before today. From now on, no more war contracts.

  Viviana sighed again. What a blunder. “What about you guys? How was your journey here?”

  “Well, we ran away from a giant frog-snake,” Lucian stated. Thomas shuddered in the corner of Viviana’s vision. “None of us knew how to use our jump boots, so we were all about to die–”

  “And Thomas is scared of snakes! So he was useless! And so was Lucian! So I picked them both up and carried them when I learned how to use the boots!”

  Vivian blinked, a little surprised at Bena’s enthusiasm. You guys were complaining about my teaching methods earlier. Now look at you…

  Actually, wait. I didn’t do anything. A random frog-snake had attacked them.

  Viviana pushed that out of her mind. She wasn’t one for teaching other people anyways. “How’d you guys deal with the frog-snake? Did it just run away?”

  “Well, that’s when those guys in black came! They rushed around, like zip-zoop-zip! Then they landed on top of the frog, and killed it! Then they said they found you over here!”

  Lucian nodded. “We got some experience for it, too. Guess the system recognized us a little despite us only running from it.”

  Alright. That’s perfectly fine. “How long was I out?”

  “Four hours. We’ve been waiting,” Lucian said. “For both you and Thomas to recover.”

  Thomas stared off into the distance, sitting down, arms curled around his legs. He wasn’t saying anything, so Lucian provided context. “He’s deathly afraid of snakes.”

  Viviana nodded idly, thinking of something else. My death has pushed back the time frame. If we wanna rest a bit before the job, we’ve got to head back now. “Bena, how close are we to a portal?”

  Bena shook her head vigorously. “Nowhere close. Those guys in black took the portal we wanted to go through, so it closed. I did figure out where we are, though. We’re on the north side of the great salt wall, so if we head south, we can get to the academy side campus!”

  Bena looked at Viviana expectantly. Viviana’s pattern recognition was good enough to know what she wanted, so she placed a hand on her head. “Good work, Bena. Which way is it?”

  A pleased expression filled Bena’s face as she pointed. Viviana looked at her team. “Alright, I wanna move for a bit. I assume all of you know how to use the jumpboots now, so I’ll meet you all there.”

  Bena looked up once Viviana took her hand off her head and turned around to leave. Bena pointed to her neck, tapping it. “Hey, Vivi, where’d you get the Maomar bandage? It’s super cute!”

  No response. Viviana sped off. Lucian watched, thinking. Maomar, the black cat from Mageborn Might. Reminds me of someone.

  …

  Viviana skated off, leaping off the salt wall. I’ve got to test something. That move I pulled off for my final strike. Accelerating muscles aside from my legs.

  She had felt it then, back when she attempted it. A clue in her mana to another skill evolution. She had tried to activate other muscles using [lightning trap], and despite the painful contractions the effects were relatively successful.

  Technically, there was no cooldown between abilities. It was just more straining to activate abilities back to back and quickly, so in practice there was, but there was no actual limit if you could take the mental strain.

  And with the reckless way Viviana fought, using abilities over and over again without any regard for fatigue, she was more than used to taking the mental strain.

  So she tried it as she moved. A small [lightning trap] on her core, hoping to spread the effect of lightning across her entire body rather than one place at a time. She activated it, and then immediately placed another one, then activated that one.

  Viviana was accelerating at a speed unattempted before. Even so, she kept on going. She lowered the time she spent placing the [lightning trap], and intermittently used [flash step] as well. The time kept lowering. She went from using an ability every couple steps, to every other step, and then to every time her feet hit the ground.

  It was completely unsustainable. The speed, the thrill, the strain on the mind. Viviana kept on going, though. There was something invigorating about the speed. About the flat salt bed extending to the horizon, and running towards it, chasing it down but never getting any closer.

  [You have refined a portion of your affinity.]

  [Feat recognized.]

  Viviana fell flat on her face. She slid approximately a hundred meters. She didn’t even care. She was laughing as she tumbled.

  System recognition!

  Viviana had expected a skill evolution. There were too many parts of [lightning trap] that she overlooked. Her ability was basically activating her mana and turning it into lightning at any location she could touch. Sure, the ability suggested using it as a trap, and its namesake reflected that, but Viviana’s best uses came from just using it to empower herself.

  She was using the ability as a way to manipulate her mana and thus her affinity directly. Viviana had expected to evolve the skill into something that would allow her to do that more easily, perhaps without having to create lightning sigils every time, but feat recognition meant something else. It meant a whole new ability was unlocked for her next level up.

  If her hunch was correct, she might get the ability she was hoping for. Despite having tumbled a hundred meters, Viviana was elated. More strength, just waiting at her fingertips.

  She hauled herself to her feet, taking in her surroundings. She couldn’t see much as she tumbled, but she was finally at her destination. Another chasm in the earth, this time a snake-like, uneven crack in the ground that spread like spiderwebs. And in the middle of the chasm were buildings surrounding a giant central lake– one so blue it looked like a mirror to the sky.

  This was the side campus of the academy. Where a large portion of the upper year students lived, and home to the student division of Ferric Meridian. Viviana observed their fortress– a massive, grey building that crawled along the earth much like the cracks that sprawled along the salt bed. Students were walking in and out, doing business for the guilds.

  In all technicality, the side campus was supposed to be a neutral zone. In reality, half of the side campus was Ferric Merridian, and you were only allowed in if you were a part of them. The other half was managed by the academy and the other guilds.

  Viviana glanced down at the FM fortress, sitting on the edge of the chasm and dangling her legs off of the edge. I can’t wait to break in soon. If I kill enough of them, will I level up?

  patreon, which is 15 chapters ahead!

  Now, aside from that, I would like to announce a schedule change. A little line on the fiction description says that we're changing to MWF in March. And well, it's March.

  We will be switching to a Monday, Wednesday, Friday schedule from now on. Hey, that means patreon is an even better deal! That's like, 5 whole weeks of chapters!