Raindrops pattered on the stone courtyard floor, cold and light. Clouds covered the night, hiding the moon.
Haru and Kaelthar looked at each other for a brief mont. Eyes locked.
The system flashed an urgent red.
[CRITICAL WARNING]
◊ Quest: ELIMINATE TARGET if you do not kill the nearby player... you will suffer SEVERE PENALTIES.
◊ Ti Remaining: 30min
Haru swallowed hard.
"Shit..."
Kaelthar didn’t need to see his system to know.
Vandris struck first. He raised his hand. Ice crystals ford quickly and sharply, until an ice dagger materialized. With it, Vandris suddenly attacked Kaelthar.
Kaelthar dodged. He turned his body. The dagger passed milliters from his neck.
Vandris attacked again. Descending strike.
Kaelthar raised his forearm, blocking with his reinforced leather guard. The ice dagger shattered, shards flying.
Vandris retreated quickly, snapped his fingers, and the guards surrounded Kaelthar with swords already raised. Without waiting, many attacked all at once.
Kaelthar was incredibly fast. He dodged the first blow. He spun. He finished off the second guard in the stomach. The guard flew backward. The third attacked from behind; Kaelthar felt it and ducked, the sword passing over his head.
Kaelthar raised his hand; a wave of black ether exploded, and the guard was thrown far away.
The fourth and fifth ca together with coordinated attacks. Kaelthar blocked one with his ceremonial dagger. He broke both their legs.
The guards who were further away started running to help, coming from all directions...
Haru, still tied up and naked, retreated.
"Untie , damn it!" he yelled at Vandris, but Vandris didn’t even care. He was focused, making runes in his hand.
Haru looked at the fight.
Kaelthar breaking arms, exploding guards with magic, with no visible effort at the speed he was generally hitting them...
"...He’s going to get here. And kill ."
◊ Ti Remaining: 27min
Haru started running in the opposite direction, anywhere far away.
He took three steps...
FWIP.
Vandris, without taking his eyes off Kaelthar, fired a bright red rune, which hit Haru in the back of the neck.
Haru felt sothing burning and penetrating his skin. He almost fell to his knees, holding onto a wooden column.
"What the hell... this must be..." He said, grabbing the back of his neck.
[YOU HAVE BEEN CURSED]
◊ Curse: Vital Pledge
Vandris smiled, without looking at him.
"Well... before you tell about Gar Eyes... Damn, isn’t there another na for this thing?"
"...HUD" Haru replied.
"What?"
"HUD. What gars see and you don’t."
"Kind of crap, but okay."
Vandris continued. "Before you tell about the HUD... I propose a contract."
"A contract?"
"Yes, a special one... Black Gold Contract."
Haru looked around. Guards were there.
He knew he didn’t have many options. Even if he wanted to refuse... he would be forced to, or he would be screwed.
"Speak."
Vandris raised his hand, fingers glowing and runes forming around it.
"Here are the clauses of our Contract... You cannot lie to ; you cannot use mana against ; you cannot attack ; you cannot run away from . Our contract will last until the "negotiation with Kaelthar" is concluded."
Haru smiled. "...That almost completely binds ."
"What if I refuse?" he asked, even knowing it would be a terrible choice.
Vandris grinned broadly.
"The buyer... will buy you already mutilated. Things must work as we want, don’t you think?"
Haru looked at the guards around him.
"I can start with the fingers, or the eyes, you choose."
Haru sighed wearily. "Deal."
He extended his hand. Vandris shook it.
The runes in the air glowed then penetrated Haru’s chest. He felt sothing taking root deep.
Vandris let go of his hand.
"No ifs, ands, or buts? You gars are really peculiar. Hehehehe..."
Haru snapped back to reality when he heard a guard’s shout.
"INVASION! WIZARDS!!! WIZARDS!!!" shouted one of Vandris’ guards.
Fireballs exploded, a whirlwind swept through the guards, lightning struck from the sky, ice pierced the earth, and the rain intensified.
The courtyard was becoming chaotic.
"Damn it," Haru said, starting to run, trying to hide among the cages scattered around the courtyard. He found one and hid behind it.
He looked up; the airship was rising. Moving away from the chaos, and in the window... Yukihi, looking down at him. Her white hair reflected the light of the explosions.
Haru clenched his fists. "I have to get to her... But ho..."
He barely finished the thought when an explosion swept through the place where he was.
Haru was thrown far away. He flew several ters. He fell rolling on the ground.
He lay on the ground coughing, hearing a slight ringing in his ears, his vision blurred.
"Damn it..." He thought, staggering to his feet.
"I need to get a little further away from Vandris so I can use mana..."
"Now that we’ve made the contract... can you remove the seal you put on ?"
Vandris smiled slightly. "I would remove it. But I can’t."
"What do you an you can’t? You’re the one who poisoned us in the warehouse. You’re the one who sealed our mana!"
"I did. But that’s not an ordinary seal."
Haru frowned.
"Then what did you do?"
"pledge of spiritual closeness."
Silence.
"Speak properly."
"While you slept, I implanted a necromantic Anchor Fragnt in you... and your wife. New spirit. Black market. Expensive. Stable."
The air grew heavy for Haru.
"Anchor...?"
"It marks you as a bound source. It attracts certain hungry spirits. It consus your mana before it forms, it’s already being eaten."
Haru took a step forward.
"Then take it off."
"That’s not how it works, I don’t ’hold’ the seal... I am its axis."
Vandris continued,
"The fragnt reacts to my presence; as long as you’re within a two-hundred-ter radius of , the draining is automatic. If you move further away than that, the anchor loses its reference... and your mana returns."
Haru turned pale.
"Then you just have to get away."
Vandris laughed.
"But you’re not afraid I’ll leave, why did you tell ?"
"Well, I told you because you asked, I never lie, and no, I’m not afraid you’ll distance yourself from ... you’re not the only one marked with this fragnt."
Haru looks at the guards, and further ahead at the guards in the courtyard...
"In exchange for their mana, they give power." Vandris adjusted his gloves calmly. "Welco to the invisible collar, boy, hehehehe I love being a necromancer alchemist."
"I need to get away from him while I can."
He looked around desperately.
In the center of the courtyard... Kaelthar and Vandris clashed so quickly they looked like beams of light.
Vandris was fat, but he wasn’t weak. Each of his blows covered much of the field, his runes were almost everywhere, generating explosions wherever they touched.
Both were bathed in aura. Vandris: dark red. Kaelthar: dark violet.
Kaelthar threw quick punches. Vandris defended against them all, with his forearms raised, blocking.
Kaelthar threw one last punch...
Vandris defended with his arms in an X shape, but the impact threw him backward.
He slid across the ground. Boots scraping against the stone.
Vandris stabilized himself. He gave a forward impulse.
In the middle of the impulse... Kaelthar stretched out his hand. Fingers spread.
Black chains erged from the ground. They wrapped around Vandris, binding his arms, legs, and torso.
"What the hell is this?!"
Vandris pulled at the chains, trying to free himself, but couldn’t. He heard a buzzing sound. He raised his head.
Kaelthar was in the air. In his right hand...
A disc of compressed energy, spinning with a violet-white glow.
Kaelthar launched it directly at Vandris’s stomach.
Vandris stretched out both hands to defend himself; the impact between his hands and the disc made his skin begin to burn, but Vandris didn’t stop, he concentrated all his strength...
Everything turned white; it was a silent explosion of pure, blazing light.
Haru, who was running into the mansion, in the middle of the chaotic field, turned his head.
He felt a need, it was as if he had to look, like a moth drawn to the light, it was inevitable. It wasn’t just him; almost everyone on the field turned, staring at the white explosion, which illuminated them blindingly.
And then...
[Vital Pledge Rune: ACTIVATED]
Haru felt sothing burning inside him. He spat out a lot of blood before collapsing to the ground in intense pain. It felt as if his chest was being pierced from the inside out; he could barely breathe, his body burned.
◊ Effect: If Vandris suffers damage... part of the damage is transferred to the marked.
◊ Damage Received: 35% of total
As if that wasn’t enough, Haru was blinded by the light.
[User is temporarily blind for 72 hours]
"I’m... screwed..."
◊ Two more hits like this = user will die permanently
◊ Quest: ELIMINATE TARGET.
◊ Ti Remaining: 20min
On the other side, amidst the smoke... Vandris stood smiling, wounded. Blood dripped from his mouth, his clothes torn, but he was still smiling.
"Hehehehe..."
He spat blood.
"I see that’s one of your Ultimate Skills..."
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
"You took half of half your mana and a bit of your HP."
Kaelthar landed a few ters away.
He looked at Vandris, surprised.
"How do you know those terms!?..."
Vandris’s eyes glowed.
Sowhat green, fluorescent.
Information floated around Kaelthar, invisible to everyone except Vandris and Kaelthar.
Vandris smiled wider.
"It’s because I have Gar’s Eyes."
"I see the HUD."
Kaelthar froze. "You... are a player?"
Vandris laughed.
"No."
He picked up the ring on his right thumb. A ruby the color of dried blood.
The ring glead. Intensely.
"But I have sothing better."
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