Return of the Runebound Professor Chapter 883: Too Easy

Screams and yells rose into the air, squeezing out between the thunderous crack of lightning and crackling flas. The roar of magic filled the arena all around Lee. A rock hurtled past her head, smoldering with so odd black magic, only to get blasted to smithereens by a hamr ford of brilliant golden light.

The ground bucked beneath Lee under the force of all the magic clashing above it. Well, that or the people that were literally tearing chunks of earth free to hurl at each other. It could have been either of the two. It really didn’t matter. Lee was a little bit preoccupied with other matters.

Her brow was knit in a deep furrow and she’d crossed her arms in front of her chest. Lee sat in the very center of the arena, pondering. A few mages had taken issue with that. The pondering, that was. Lee had to assu that to be the case, because she was pretty sure there was no law against sitting down during a tournant.

Or maybe it was the pondering that they didn’t like, and the sitting was actually okay?

Lee paused for a mont. Then she glanced to one of the severed limbs littering the ground around her. So mages had left them behind after attempting to attack her. Unfortunately, nobody had left a mouth behind. Lee doubted an arm was about to go answering any of her questions.

Blowing out a huff, Lee snagged a hand. She took a bite out of it and chewed thoughtfully for a few seconds. She’d been working on that. Chewing. Not because she needed to, but because it made for more polite company. It wasn’t her favorite. Chewing gave other people too much ti to eat food before she could get to it.

Sothing stirred deep in Lee’s chest at that.

A jerk, deep in her stomach. A flicker of smoldering emotion, ancient and ravenous.

I don’t share.

Goosebumps prickled across her skin. Her hair stood on end. Lee’s back stiffened as she ground her jaw shut.

There it was, again.

The power.

It wasn’t anything new. This magic — this depthless hunger — it had been there for as long as she’d been alive. There hadn’t been a single day when she hadn’t been aware of it. But never had she been more aware of it than now. Ever since she’d consud Decras’ rune and drawn it into herself, the hunger had gotten louder.

It had gotten hungrier.

But her thoughts were still her own. No longer did her runes push her toward mindless starvation. And, in so ways, that was even scarier. The hunger wasn’t coming from sowhere. There was no enemy. No problem to be solved. Nothing to point the finger at fix.

There was just Lee.

The hunger was hers, and she liked it.

But that did not an she had to bend to it. She was still in control. Not having an enemy was a double edged sword. There wasn’t anybody controlling her mind. Lee’s legs moved only to her own will. She was her own being. The hunger was simply a part of her.

At least… I think it is.

That was what she’d been testing.

She looked back at the ring of splattered mage parts around her. Then she nodded to herself in satisfaction. She’d done a pretty good job. Lee had only eaten a few of them. That was restraint. If so ravenous beast had truly been chained up deep within her, it would have eaten all of them.

Lee rose to her feet. She glanced at the arm in her hand. It was only half-eaten. It did seem like a sha to waste a good arm. It wasn’t like the owner was going to use it. He’d run off. And if you left an arm behind, you clearly didn’t need it.

She slid the rest of the limb into her gullet. Then she swallowed.

Ah, shit. I forgot to chew.

The hair on the back of Lee’s neck prickled. Her head snapped to the side and a sliver of tal scread past her head, slicing so close that she felt the air against her nose. The tal snaked back across the arena to coil around the fingers of a young man in a river of liquid silver-gray, his features set in a cold scowl.

“You dodged,” he said, in an accent Lee couldn’t quite place. “I wasn’t expecting that. It looked like your head was sowhere else.”

Lee tilted her head to the side. “You attacked when I wasn’t paying attention?”

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“It’s a tournant,” the man said with a smirk. “That’s the point. And if you’re going to sit around doing nothing, then you’re just asking soone to kill you.”

Then he flicked his fingers. The river of tal coiling along his arm snapped out like a striking snake. It slithered through the air toward Lee, its motion a hypnotic blur.

She dodged to the side. The river of tal just barely passed her by a second ti, finding nothing but air and yanking back to coil around the man’s wrist once more.

“I wasn’t doing nothing,” Lee said. “I was eating.”

Disgust passed over the man’s features. “A limb. Yes. I saw. Filthy. I can understand tolerating demons… but one such as you has no place in civilized company.”

“Probably not,” Lee agreed. “But I don’t think any of that is here. You don’t really seem worth my ti to fight. I think you should leave. I’d rather just think.”

A smile curled across the man’s lips. He flicked his hand forward again, sending his slithering tal magic striking out once more, but the blow once again failed to connect with Lee. Stress was starting to show in his features. There was no doubt at all that he was fast. It didn’t seem like he was used to missing so many attacks in a row.

“Your taunts will not work on ,” he snarled. “You hide behind words and feigned strength. But I haven’t seen you use any magic at all. You’re a body-enhancer. And against a tal-mage like , you have no way to win. But you’ve already figured that out, haven’t you?”

A silvery sheen passed over the man’s entire body, running beneath his clothes to cover every single part of his skin. Even his eyes turned glossy and cold.

“Shiny,” Lee said. “Looks dense.”

The man’s lips pulled into a sneer. “Just surrender. I don’t really care about killing you. Death brings no satisfaction. My only target is passing farther in this tournant by taking out the weakest enemies and winning in the easiest manner possible. That’s what life is about. And you’re an easy target.”

Lee stared at the man for a mont. Then she sighed.

“Do you know you just need one?” Lee asked.

“What?” The man’s eyes narrowed. He’d picked up on the fact that Lee didn’t seem concerned by his transformation. “One? One what?”

“Yeah,” Lee said. “Just one. But it has to be the right one. They only pull you out of the tournant when you can’t fight anymore.”

“Don’t screw with !” The man exploded into motion toward Lee, letting out a scream as he slashed his hands through the air before him. A rippling wave of silvery tal carved out toward Lee.

She blurred.

The man stumbled, suddenly finding Lee standing a foot to his side. He spun. Then he stumbled, tripping and falling flat on his face with a loud crash. There was a ringing clang from behind him as one of his legs fell in the opposite direction, severed at the knee. No blood erged from the limb. It was, after all, solid tal.

“Wow,” Lee said, picking it up. “That wasn’t just skin-level? You turn your whole body to tal? That’s a pretty cool technique.”

Disbelief exploded across the man’s features. He shoved himself to the side, slashing at Lee with a whiplike strand of tal—

A rending shriek cut through the air.

Lee stood on the mage’s other side, holding his left arm.

“Two,” Lee said. Her head tilted to the side. “See? If I’d taken both of your arms, then they’d probably have ported you out already yet. But one leg and one arm — that’s still enough. You can still crawl a bit. And you can also still punch. That’s enough. Right?”

The confidence on the mage’s features was gone. It had been replaced by horror. His lips worked, but it looked like he was in a state of partial shock. It didn’t seem like he’d yet registered the fact that his defenses ant nothing at all to Lee.

Then a splash of anger washed across his fear. tal bubbled at the sites of his severed limbs. It exploded out from his body in thick strands, winding together to reform muscle and tallic flesh. His limbs had reford within instants. The man thrust himself back to his feet, teeth bared.

“You were holding back. You didn’t move like that before.”

“Isn’t that the point of a tournant? I hadn’t t anyone strong enough to make try harder yet,” Lee replied. She looked at the limbs still in her hand. Then she tossed them to the side. tal wasn’t very tasty in the first place.

“So this is what you’re capable of?” The man ran his tongue ran along his lips. Then he smirked. “I underestimated you. I’ll back off. We’re too closely matched. There are easier targets.”

Lee stared at him for a mont.

“You said you only wanted an easy way forward in the tournant,” Lee said. “Right?”

“Right I did,” the man replied with a cold smile. “And I reckon we could find a way to do so real damage to each other at so point, but it ain’t going to be anyti soon. Not worth the effort, wouldn’t you say?”

“I also want to get farther in the tournant,” Lee said with a nod. “But you’re wrong.”

“About what?” The man asked.

“You said isn’t worth the effort,” Lee said.

She blurred, slamming into the man in a blur. Lee planted her foot on his chest as her hands clamped down on his arms. tal shrieked. Cracks raced down the man’s arms as he struggled beneath her. Then, with a final screech, Lee tore both of his arms off.

“Are you an idiot?” The man snarled. “You can’t hurt ! This is just—”

Lee’s hand clamped down on the man’s head, warping the tal beneath her grip. Then she chomped down on the side of his neck.

tal warped beneath her teeth.

And then they t sothing else.

Magic.

Lee’s jaw closed down. Blood spurted into her mouth, mixed with a river of stolen energy.

The man let out a scream of pain. He staggered back, eyes going as wide as saucers as he looked at the fountain of blood spurting out from his neck. There was no tal left around the area where Lee had bit him. All that remained was plain flesh.

“It’s worth the effort,” Lee said. Her tongue ran along her lips. “Because it’s easy.”

The man took a step back. His lips trembled, terror bubbling up in his features. Then his eyes rolled back in his head, the imnse blood loss overwhelming whatever words he may have been hoping to say. He pitched backward. A pillar of light crashed down, swallowing him before he could hit the ground.

Lee stared at the spot where he’d been for a mont. Then she looked at the two tal hands still in her grip. They hadn’t changed back to flesh.

Deep in her stomach, the hunger bubbled.

She still wasn’t satisfied.

“Damn,” Lee said.

Then she turned in search of her next target.

These als weren’t satisfying at all. If she wanted a proper al, she was going to really have to make sure to win her bet with Brayden.