Evaluation Begins

He stared at the lump of oozing meat in his lap, distantly wondering if he was being mocked. He rolled his neck back, jerking his lulling head up to send a questioning look at the demon.

The creature from the pits chuckled, the sound echoing in his mind like a horde of scratching claws made of burning smoke. "A demon's flesh, willingly given to replace what you sacrificed. Sew it on, further your bond to the Dark Lords, and perhaps you may one day take your place amongst our ranks."

He blinked slowly, processing the entity's words as best as his addled mind could manage. His ability to reason and consider was almost entirely inoperable, but the part of his mind that had been hammered into shape by his master to comprehend and follow orders was so much a foundation of his being that eventually, in the absence of logic and coherent thought, he defaulted to simply doing as he was told. He was aware of the demon laughing as he unthinkingly conjured arms of flame to lift up the severed hand and begin searching for his needle and thread, but he wasn’t cognizant enough to understand what the sharp, repeating noise really meant; he had lost enough blood that his master would normally dismiss him as beyond saving in triage, the fact he was still able to move and think at all was likely only by the grace of Frotzenglu’s blessing.

He could feel the flow of demonic power surging through him beginning to fade, though this thought merely floated about in his muddled mind as he found his needle and began the painstaking process of threading it through his own and the demon's flesh. He barely even noticed the red slowly fading from his fiery arm as the shadows at the edge of his already dark vision began to slowly consume his watery murky thoughts. By the time he finished the last stitch, the ritual had almost entirely run its course and he was surrounded by a small horde of laughing demons.

The moment the ritual finally died out and the demons dancing about his swimming vision were pulled back through the hole in his stomach, he felt what few dredges of energy he had left vanish into an infinite pit of exhaustion, and he succumbed to unconsciousness immediately.

I was wrong. While my balance was significantly better than it had ever been in my last life and I did indeed blitz through the first six balance beams (even the spinny one that was built like a fucking rollingpin), the seventh was made out of some sort of bouncy, rubbery wood and that bastard kept shaking the whole thing. I face planted several times before managing to -just barely- make it all the way across.

Even still, a single glance at the next one had me reconsidering even trying to finish this gambit. The damn thing was suspended beneath an ever flowing river of clear oil that spun the entire thing constantly and rapidly, and had several sections that were just missing. I would need to somehow maintain my balance on a spinning log under a deluge and accurately jump often several feet just to be rewarded by some other grueling and unrewarding task.

The only benefit of the whole experience thus far was gaining three points in Agility; I have no interest in breaking my neck for a few measly points and some asshat’s approval. I turned to tell him exactly that, only to find his face inches from my own, eyes like cooling blood staring into mine from so close I could count the veins in them. I stumbled back, startled and more than a touch afraid; that fear swiftly turned to anger, both at him for sneaking up on me and at myself for letting him. Before I could voice my indignation, he spoke up, "You're thinking of giving up, of not even trying; that is not how you grow strong, how you gain skills."

I frowned, knowing he was technically right. Even still, pushing your limits too far is how you break yourself. "Killing yourself trying to take a step too far isn't a good way to grow stronger either. When your life is on the line, any option is better than surrender, but I'm not about to die if I don't-"

A vision of a bone white blade going for my neck flashed through my mind. I was already throwing myself backwards before reality snapped to meet my foresight, but Rokharth moved faster. He grabbed me by the back of the head faster than I could blink, pushing his dagger against my throat just hard enough for me to feel its razor edge on my skin. The oil over my flesh kept the blade from actually cutting me, but it was so sharp the hairs between it and my throat were cleanly cut through without effort.

His eyes burned into mine, "Aren't you? Are you certain?" His voice rumbled darkly, slithering into my ears and agitating the flies within. I vanished in a puff of smoke without hesitation, appearing behind him with my tail darting for his neck.

He whirled faster than I could comprehend, grabbing my tail just beneath the bladed tip and throwing me across the room. I whirled in midair, trailing angry flies as I spun to land on my feet. I hit the ground and slid several feet back, my eyes focused unerringly on Rokharth even as my extra senses scanned the area for any less obvious threats. I didn't meet his gaze, taking his own advice and staring instead at his torso even as I desperately tried to come up with a way out of this. I couldn't beat him in a fight and his obviously superior speed meant running was just as dubious, yet I could already see him shifting his weight in a way I presumed meant he was about to charge.

Well then, when you can't compete, cheat.

Pink fire exploded around my hand, and though I had little control it was enough to crudely hurl it at the assassin before me. It was less a ball and more a cobbled together glob of flame, but nonetheless it managed to cross the room. Rokharth laughed at my attack, raising his own left hand and outright grabbing the flames in a display of such physics breaking insanity that my train of thought jumped the tracks and skittered brokenly for a moment. I watched as the incandescent glob of flame in his hand rapidly shrank away before he tossed the remains aside to disperse in midair.

Shocked as I was, I had never expected that attack to actually work; from the moment I let the flames fly, I had been focusing on channeling the Blight into that same hand. The flames that danced in my palm now were a startlingly dull grey, the very essence of monotony beaten into an infectious colour that seemed to lap at the very air around it. I was interrupted before I could actually throw the flames by the sound of clapping coming from behind me. My eyes flew wide, barely wasting the split moment it took for my mind to catch up to my eyes telling me Rokharth was gone before I whirled around.

The flames around my hand sputtered out the moment my eyes met his, the world going dark and cold around me as a terrible pressure bore down on me. I felt my knees bending, my back bowing under the force as his crimson eyes consumed my vision. My chest grew tight and it felt like every breath of suddenly frigid air was being sucked in through a stirring straw. I… I was going to pass out… and I hadn’t even made the bastard flinch.

That thought sparked a flicker of indignation inside me, a single spark that grew into a raging fire of hate and anger when it met the boiling fuel that was my beleaguered pride. My eyes blazed as I bit my tongue hard enough to draw blood, tearing my eyes away from his and lunging up at him from my half kneeling position. I didn’t have time to pull the Blight to the surface once more, but the pink flames that leapt back to life in my hand as I flew would have to do.

Hp -1

Will +1

Conjure Painfyre +1

Even with my newfound foresight, my vision of his hand starting to move had barely begun before his arm blurred and my world went dark. My last conscious thought was that apparently combat precognition isn't very useful when your enemy can move fast enough to intercept your vision of their actions.