Octavius stared down the dozens of thrall mages in front of him. They stretched from wall to wall, eight abreast, and endless ranks deep. The blue glow of mana bullets reflected off the stone walls, and he shifted his grip on his silver spear. As soon as the first thrall completed its spell, he activated his own.

Suddenly, the entire area was coated in a thick blackness. It wasn't a slow fade to black that signified the casting of the spell. Instead, one moment they all stood in the dim light from the corridor behind his back, and the next, they were engulfed by an unnatural darkness.

The moment that his spell activated, he dove to the side. As he fell back into a defensive stance, he could sense the glowing blue bullet of pure mana sail through the place where he had been standing. It was quickly followed by half a dozen more, each one a beacon to his shadow sense.

Mana flowed unceasingly from his core at an incredible rate. The spell less manipulated shadow than it did create shadow. From the small seed that was the shadows that had previously lined the corridor, he had fueled them with his mana until no amount of light could penetrate even an inch into the thick black fog. Not just visible light either. He didn't know how the thralls could see, but it didn't matter if not even infrared or ultraviolet rays were capable of passing through his spell.

Even as useful as the spell was, he knew that he'd run out of mana entirely within half a minute if he tried to cover a large area. Instead, he slowly let the spell become more and more permeable until he was satisfied with the ratio of its rate of mana usage to its effectiveness.

Opening his eyes, he watched as another mana bullet flew past him two feet to his left. It was only a slightly noticeable glow in the otherwise pitch-black darkness that surrounded him. He tasted the neutral flavor of the mana potion in his mouth and smiled. With the mana potion, he had enough mana to hold the spell for two minutes and still have three hundred or so leftover.

He heard so many shouts from the line of thralls that he wasn't even able to distinguish one from another, and he guessed that the thralls couldn't either. Instead, he easily weaved between the occasional mana bullet that managed to fly in his general direction. After ten seconds, he considered just turning around and leaving. At the rate that the thralls were going, they wouldn't even realize that he was gone until he removed the spell.

As soon as he had the thought, however, the booming voice of Kzedr reached him from far too close for his liking.

"Make way for the rogues, you fools!" its deep voice rumbled through the confined space. Octavius's shadow sense only stretched to the front rank of the thrall mages, but he was able to sense them as they scrambled aside. With his shadow sense covering such an area, he wasn't able to interpret specifics about the thralls that now approached him. What he was able to sense, however, were the general shapes of the blades in their hands.

They moved forward as a straight line, and he cursed silently. These rogues were clearly at least led by a thrall with experience. With them spread out, they would eventually make contact with him. From there, they could simply surround him and prevent any escape. There was likely one thing that they didn't expect, however, and it was that he was far from as blind as they were.

As the thralls grew closer, he decreased the range of his shadow sense to a circle with a radius of only six feet. As the amount of stimuli within the range decreased, he was easily able to sense even the small movements that the thralls made as they closed on him.

He stood in a low crouch on the right side of the hallway. The corridor was a mere four feet behind him. The thralls themselves moved slowly with their blades held out in front of them.

Octavius counted the seconds as they passed. The ten seconds from Finn's departure turned quickly to fifteen and was approaching twenty when he struck.

The thrall before was likely only able to see the point of his spear rushing toward it for a split second before its eye was impaled. He quickly withdrew the spear as it collapsed to the ground. Dancing backward to avoid being encircled by the line, he checked the blue-colored box at the edge of his vision.

You have slain Xecz - Thrall (F) (Lvl 26) and gained 3250 EXP (1/2)(26)(1)(2)(1.25)(100)(1.00)

Well, I guess it was a rogue that had already reached level 25, he realized, That might explain their competency.

That competency, however, seemed to break down even as he had the thought. The line of thralls immediately moved to converge on where their comrade had fallen. It might have worked if he hadn't known their strategy and already retreated back into the corridor.

Twenty seconds, he counted, twenty-five.

The thralls shouted to each other in the darkness, trying to get an idea of what had happened. There was another sudden shout, though this one wasn't from Kzedr. Octavius didn't recognize the voice of this thrall but was able to hear it just fine.

"All of you!" it shouted, "Charge the human! Don't let it escape!"

Octavius cursed softly under his breath. That was exactly the opposite of what he wanted them to do. He wasn't defending a narrow bridge like in the tales of old, holding off a hoard of Vikings one at a time. The hallway that he guarded was three yards across. The edges of his shadow sense picked up a hoard of the gray-skinned aliens charging him with blades drawn.

Thirty seconds, thirty-five seconds, he sounded off to himself.

His hand tightened its grip on his spear, and he pulled in his shadow sense further. Soon, it was only covering an area of four feet in every direction. The difference was that now he was nigh omniscient within that area for the time being. He wasn't playing offense, he was playing defense through and through, and such knowledge would allow him to defend against any attacks from any direction.

More shouting came from the thralls, but he tuned it out. Instead, he closed his eyes and focused. The first thrall quickly reached him and ran straight past. Moving deftly, he avoided so much as brushing against it.

For an entire five seconds, he wove between the thralls as they searched for him in the darkness. After a moment, the shouting took on a confused edge, and he realized that they might have begun to think that he had already left the area.

The next thrall that came close to him he attacked. As it swung its blade in the air wildly, he moved to its side and swept its feet out from under it with his spear. Before he could finish it off, he was forced to avoid another flailing thrall.

Damnit! he cursed, I get that they'd have to be really unlucky to accidentally lack on a vulnerable portion of one of their comrades' exoskeletons, but you'd think they'd be at least a little more careful.

As the thrall moved past him, he slammed his shoulder into its back and sent it sprawling. He started back toward the first thrall that he had tripped, but it had already scrambled back to its feet and begun to shout for help.

"I found it!" it called out, "I found the human! It's over here!"

Octavius quickly moved out of the area as more thralls followed the sound of the shouts toward where it had previously been. Forty seconds, he counted, his heartbeat slow and relaxed, forty-five. Come on, come on!

He decided to start moving toward the side of the corridor that would lead toward the exit. When he had first entered the corridor, he was on the side closer to where his cell had been than to where the secret exit was. He sought to rectify the situation as the clock ticked ever so slowly down to the one minute mark that he had set for himself.

He sidestepped a thrall rogue that was quickly moving toward the sound of the first thrall's voice and suddenly frozen. Twitching his nose, he smelt a strong, acrid odor.

What the hell? he puzzled, Is that smoke?

It only took him a single moment to realize what the smell meant. There was only one place he knew of that had been filling with smoke for the past half-day, and it was the massive entrance hall. He instantly expanded the range of his shadow sense spell, forgoing his delicate senses for the knowledge of what the thralls were doing.

He had to stop himself from audibly gasping when he realized what was happening. Wood from the thick door that sealed the entrance chamber shut flowed from it like some form of gravity-defying water. The wood only left bars an inch thick untouched as the door was harvested for material.

The wood then flowed to either side of the set of doorways and began to construct two walls. The walls were identical to what they had left of the door, with thick bars of wood at regular intervals. He could sense the dozen robed wood shapers as they worked together to move the wood at a speed that threatened to trap Octavius.

In a second, he had considered his options. It was entirely clear to him that even if there weren't any thralls in his way, which there most definitely were, he couldn't reach the far wall before it was completed. That meant that the secret exit was cut off from him, but it also meant that the thralls couldn't go down it either.

The only other exit that he knew the location of was the main exit. He'd likely be severely wounded if he tried to climb through the fire and smoke in that direction, but he had health potions and a superhuman vitality. However, just one clear sense of the wooden bars that remained of the door made it clear that he wouldn't be able to easily break through. He probably could do so with a minute, or even thirty seconds, to spare, but he wouldn't even get a few seconds before he would be found out and overrun.

That left the closest open avenue of retreat as the only option. Fortunately for him, the corridor in that direction was what he had the most experience with. Unfortunately, however, was the fact that he didn't think that there was a single exit in that direction.

Even as untasteful as the option was, he knew that it was the only real choice. In the second that he'd taken to ascertain the situation and make his decision, the wall had already crossed half the distance across the corridor.

Moving quickly, he sidestepped around a thrall and sprinted into the gap as it closed. His knuckles turned white against his spear's shaft as his jaw clenched.

Fifty seconds, he counted, FUCK!

Even as he quickly came to terms with what had happened, his mind raced to come up with a viable plan. I have a few seconds without them knowing where I am, he realized, but the moment I run out of mana, they'll be able to see me plain as day through the gaps in the wall. This direction leads to their most valuable possessions, like the Suppressor and the Anchor. There's no way that they'll just let me run around the area.

So they'll come after me. That means that they'll have to open up the walls, he reasoned, If I can hide myself then double back when they aren't prepared, I can still get out. Only, how will I be able to do that?

An idea immediately flashed through his mind. He could use the thin, pitch-black hallways of the prison area. It was perfect. There were so many offshoots that they'd have to check that he'd almost definitely be presented with at least one opportunity.

He broke into a sprint down the corridor, taking advantage of his superhuman stats and long legs to cover the distance incredibly quickly. A headache began to prick at him as his mana raced toward empty, and he swallowed the potion that remained in his mouth.

Even with a refilled mana pool, however, he was forced to drop his darkness spell after only fifty feet. The distance between him and the spell simply made the cost far too great for him to hold. He threw himself to the side of the corridor as the black mist faded, hoping desperately for none of the thralls to notice him.

Alas, it was not to be. After a moment of surprised silence from the thralls as they could suddenly see again, a single shout rang out in the corridor.

"The human's right over there!" it bellowed, "Get this damned barricade open right fucking now!"

Octavius cursed as he put his head down and ran for his life. He needed to put enough distance between himself and his pursuers that they wouldn't be able to see him around the corridors bend and decline. If they could just see him as he ran into the prison area, entering it wouldn't do much good.

More shouts echoed from behind him, but all of his attention was focused on running. His eyes flicked to the statuses of the members of his party at the edge of his vision. A grin threatened to spread across his face when he saw that none of them were so much as injured.

That makes more than a full minute, he decided, and they're still focused on me. Marcus and the others will be able to see that I'm still alive. I wonder if they'll try to convince Robert to try for another rescue attempt? Either way, I guess I succeeded in keeping these fuckers attention for long enough. Now I just need to survive.

His boots pounded into the hard stone ground in a rhythmic pattern that's sound was lost in the cacophony of similar noises from the thralls that were hot on his heels. Plain wooden doors flew past him on both sides as he sprinted for all that he was worth.

The weight of his spear, armor, and gear combined felt like almost nothing to his superhuman strength. If not for the pounding of his heart and the hostile shouts from behind him, he could have been going for a morning run around the grounds of his family manor back in the states.

On his stealthy trip up the tunnel when he had escaped only days before, the trip had taken many long minutes. Now, however, he guessed that he was going to reach the cells of the prison area within a single minute or two at most.

As he ran through the familiar corridor, he failed to encounter a single thrall. Even within the corridor on the other side of the entrance hall, they had only found a mere handful of thralls that weren't guarding the human captives. It seemed as though the side that he was sprinting through was under similar circumstances.

Forty seconds passed, and he managed to pull farther ahead of his pursuers. While he had no doubt that at least some of them had higher agility scores than him, the flat and relatively straight path was entirely conducive to the long strides that his six-foot frame allowed for.

Deciding that it was worth it to throw them off of his trail, he forced the next door he passed open with a light shove. He repeated the action four doors down before resuming his all-out sprint.

After another five seconds, he recognized the door to the sleeping quarters that he had hidden within during his escape. I'm nearly there, he realized. As he passed it, he shoved open the door that would lead down to the underground river. He looked down the final decline that he knew would lead him to the prison area along with the fork in the corridor and took it with long, bounding steps.