Captain Revayne hadn’t thought things would turn this disastrous. Even when she had stood before that monster, that Planar Bonestrider, she hadn’t believed they would have suffered this much. After all, they had worked together well so far.

  But oh, how she had been disabused of all her hope. It shouldn’t have been surprising. That was a creature who fought toe to toe with Councillors. Of course the rest of them wouldn’t have been able to stymie it for long. Even with superior numbers, the difference in their powers was just too great.

  As was proven when even Ross was tossed back not so differently from how Revayne herself had been.

  Her heart felt like it was turning to dust as she watched the Netherthreads descend on where Ross had fallen. The Bonestrider had stripped him of everything that had been protecting him. This creature…

  She gulped a quick, haggard breath down, then forced herself to rise. No thinking about Ross. Nor about Sergeant Shatri. The fallen could be remembered in due time.

  “Captain,” the healer warned. “You are far from ready to fight again.”

  “It can’t be helped,” she said, wincing a little. “You’ve done well, thank you. Now prepare yourselves. Prepare to fight.”

  She was the last person to be saying something along those lines. The Netherthreads had done a number on her. Despite Ross’s quick thinking, despite the healer’s best attempt, she still couldn’t feel her listless left arm, and a third of her field of view was just… dark. Something was wrong with her eyes.

  Then there was the feeling like some strange growth was twisting and slithering within her, like overeager parasites determined to consume her from within. The less said about the pain of it all, the better.

  Captain Revayne had a job to do. She had a fallen sergeant whose memories and efforts she had to honour. To the bitter end, if needed.

  “Expeditioners!” she yelled. Whatever was wrong with her body now, at least it wasn’t affecting her ability to yell over the din of the onrushing monsters. “Those who can stand, fight. Those who can speak, scream. Those who yet live, continue. Giving up is not an option. We will struggle till the end, we will fight until the very last twitch of our bodies, because that is why we are here, in the bowels of the Pits, and no one else. We will not surrender!”

  There were no cheers at her words. No rousing cries answered her own ferocity. The expedition had been beaten down, vastly diminished, forced to contemplate its own mortality in the face of escalating danger. She wasn’t surprised that the others weren’t replying to her.

  But she was Captain Revayne and she had a job to do. Even if said job might end up killing her.

  “Captain.” Glissa’s voice was tremendously small, diminished after everything she had seen and experienced in the Nether Vein. “Can you tell my parents that I did my best? No matter what happens to me, they’ll be happy knowing I gave it my all. Well, they’ll be sad at first but…”

  She went on rambling, her voice growing weaker by the second. Revayne let her continue. Her eyes were noting down the exact locations where the Lesser Bonestriders were charging in from. She’d have loved to tackle them with Escapism directly, but that was beyond any of them now. The others were barely standing.

  “…sad I won’t be able to attend your wedding,” Glissa said.

  Revayne was jerked out of her current reality so hard, she ended up laughing. No, bad. Bad. She quickly contained herself, her book flipping through pages at a rapid pace to contain her sudden mirth at mentioning something as mundane as a wedding in the face of utter slaughter. Pits, she had almost let her emotions run away.

  “Captain?” Glissa asked softly.

  “It’s nothing,” Revayne said. “Don’t worry, Glissa. We’re heroes. They’ll be talking about us for centuries.”

  The monsters had gathered close. While the real threat, the Planar Bonestrider, was approaching at an almost lazy gait, its lesser brethren were almost upon them. Revayne was quickly flipping through her pages, trying to recreate the Story she had used during their last defence. It’d need her to focus fully on her Aspect, but she’d hopefully get the chance.

  Her fellow expeditioners, such that they remained, were stepping up. The Scalekin with the wings and knives had jagged red threads running the whole length of him. His companion, formerly kneeling next to their fallen Rakshasa tank, had risen to wield a rapier while her Aspect sparked with glowing monochrome threads.

  They weren’t the only ones. Healers were picking up weapons, alchemists were readying potions, a couple of artificers were even now preparing some kind of contraption to fight back the hordes of monsters about to descend upon them.

  The surviving adventurers were buffing themselves up too, their Aspects raring to go. They were all as ready as they’d ever be.

  Thankfully, it looked like they’d only need to deal with the monsters. The Councillor had chosen well. All of them had great experience in regular combat. Revayne could help manage that. She’d have to focus less if there were only creatures she had to fight back, not those Netherthreads too.

  Captain Revayne froze for a moment as a sudden hope slowly rekindled. Only monsters… no Netherthreads…

  The artificial star was still burning bright overhead. Ross was still alive.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  So where in the world was he?

  The battle started when the monsters rushed in with wild swings and piercing screeches. Revayne didn’t move an inch. She had mastered her impulses long ago, and though they screamed at her to jump into the fray, she was well aware of her true role. So, she focused on her Aspect of Escapism.

  Dimly, she noted the others stepping up with everything they had. The Scalekin with the knives tore through hordes of the creatures. Another adventurer flung what looked like comets from her hand.

  An alchemist had thrown a strange, sparkling powder over all the warriors, buffing them even further. The monsters somehow had a harder time landing hits on their targets.

  Eventually, it was Revayne’s turn. Her Aspect burgeoned as her book retold the story of a valiant defence. Of unyielding inky soldiers rising to fight to their last breaths, of incredible powers flung in liquid blackness, of the tides of battle shifting and turning.

  It worked again, of course. Even with their diminished numbers and fortitude, they still had far greater strength than the rabble of lesser monsters.

  So, why? Why was the Bonestrider content to let the weaklings rush the expeditioners and die in the attempt? Was it not confident enough that it could take them all at once on its own, using the fodder to soften them up before entering the field of battle itself?

  Maybe she was ascribing too much intelligence where there might not be any… but then, she had seen how it had taken down Ross.

  And then it attacked.

  Revayne roared out as she threw herself forward to meet it. Her Story had done enough to assist the others with the endless lesser creatures. The rest was on them entirely. Right now, the best way she could assist was by tackling the real monster herself.

  Their meeting was entirely surprising. The sheer force behind just one contact, where her inky sabre met that bony weapon, ripped through her arm. It got dislocated from her shoulder entirely. Honestly, she’d have to thank her Opal-ranked Vitality that it hadn’t been ripped off her body entirely.

  But no. She couldn’t let this stand. Revayne screamed out as her arm righted itself, re-inserting into her shoulder’s socket.

  Her Vitality Augmentation was firing on all cylinders. Battle Reforged meant that so long as she continued fighting through any injuries, she could forcefully heal them back up. Well, “heal”. It wasn’t perfect. Just a stopgap to let her keep fighting until she could see a real healer.

  Like the ones lying dead nearby.

  It was incredibly hubristic to think she could match an Onyx-ranked monster even if she was buffed up stronger than her Opal rank in most Aspects and Attributes would suggest. She stuck to it, regardless. Her arm continued to shatter, her muscles continued to tear, her whole body ripping itself apart to just barely keep herself conscious against this abomination.

  An overhead strike from the monster slammed down. Captain Revayne did her best to deflect the blow down to the metal ground. Still. The impact was enough to send her staggering back several handspans.

  The pages of her book flipped by at an incredible pace. She had never thought she’d need this Story, but there was no choice now.

  Her body was essentially shattered. She breathed pain. Her ribs had punctured her lungs, her blood vessels were spilling their vital contents all throughout her, and half her muscles and tendons had been ripped off their bones.

  Yet she forged on unrelenting. The only reason—the Story of a survivor, a warrior, an indomitable spirit who wasn’t cowed, who wasn’t beaten, even in the face of gods.

  Inky power took form all over Revayne’s figure. They wrapped her arms and legs, formed patchwork armour all across her torso. Every bit of ink was connected straight to her head, to her brain, and it was Captain Revayne’s indomitable will alone that kept her moving. That kept her fighting.

  In truth, Revayne’s body had given up long ago. Normal circumstances would have seen her fall, would have her sidelined for far too long as healers diligently reconstructed the fleshy putty she had reduced herself to into an actual, capable body again.

  But with her ink, with her Aspect of Escapism, she could create—had been forced to create—an exoskeleton of solid black that she could recreate and control her body through will alone to keep herself going.

  The monster raised its weapon in her direction.

  Revayne braced herself to continue fighting, regardless of its futility.

  Then the ground shook. It wasn’t just Revayne who was surprised. The Bonestrider, which had been about to attack, was suddenly all stiff and careful. Another tremor rocked the metal floor before Revayne could even begin to figure out where it was coming from.

  Deep purple threads waved through the ground. Her eyes widened. This power…

  All around Revayne, the ground ripped and tore apart. Chunks of metal rose to float in the air, all the shrapnel contorting and rupturing with incredible ease. Everything kept shaking, threatening to break apart.

  Everything except the spots where Revayne and the other expeditioners were standing.

  Far behind them all, a fiery light turned incandescent as the pieces of floating metal all started flying towards it like insects drawn to flames. Revayne turned, her whole body freezing despite the sudden wash of heat.

  Ross was back on his feet, his body surrounded by the aura of a lesser Bonestrider. He had become a living pyre with an inferno storming around him. The metal pieces didn’t burn or melt. Instead, they coagulated around him in enormous clumps, forming tiny moons orbiting him at a steady pace.

  Revayne swallowed. She had seen this before at a distance. When he had torn through the Blight Swarm.

  Ross didn’t rush over. He didn’t charge in. Not yet. Despite the rest of the battle still surging around Revayne, she found herself waiting—alongside the Bonestrider did too, for some Pits-forsaken reason—as Ross finally joined them at his pace.

  She felt like she was burning. Like any second now, her hair and guard uniform would catch fire. That inferno of Ross’s was too intense. Even when they were nearly thirty handspans apart.

  “Sorry I’m late,” Ross said. There was a grind in his voice, like he had swallowed crushed rocks and was speaking past them. “Now, let’s kill that bastard once and for all.”

  Captain Revayne couldn’t explain the sudden energy trying to invigorate her. “Unlike you, Ross, I don’t think I’ve discovered a second wind. If anything, I’m on my last leg.” She didn’t hide the truth. “On my last life, perhaps.”

  His eyes flickered to her briefly. She didn’t want to worry him. He had been a constant companion, and with his power, he might just survive if he wished. She’d like for him to live.

  “I think we’re all going to get a second wind any time now…”

  His cryptic words got an explanation a heartbeat later in the form of a Weave window materializing before her, power rushing through her like she had just been connected to a second mana core.

  [ Ritual

  Ritual Established: Ritual of War. You have performed 1 [Major] Ritual of War.

  Reward: All Iron-ranked Aspects and Attributes raised by 20 ranks, all Silver-ranked Aspects and Attributes raised by 15 ranks, all Gold-ranked Aspects and Attributes raised by 10 ranks, and all Opal-ranked Aspects and Attributes raised by 5 ranks for the next 7 hours and 5 minutes. All negative auric effects negated and all boon effects and buffs boosted by 2.5x for the same duration. ]