We started to walk deeper into the forest as we called out, still not having a better idea on how to find the missing people. We were in a bubble of light surrounded by darkness. With nothing but infected forest visible to us, it was quite an unnerving atmosphere. “By the way, my name’s Dean,” I said, introducing myself as we walked along. I wanted to distract myself from thinking about what was around us.

“Call me Brad,” he replied. Neither of us went to shake hands, keeping our full focus on our surroundings while I had my staff at the ready and Brad gripped his torch tightly.

“Dean…’” he said slowly, as though thinking. “You wouldn’t happen to be the kid that first reported a problem in this area, would you?”

Again with the kid?! He looked like he might be only about forty. Not old enough to be calling me a kid. I let it go. “Actually, yes, that’s me.”

I saw him nod out of the corner of my eye. “Your name was in the report. Thanks to you, once it was confirmed there was something wrong with the forest, it was sealed off and shifts were organized to make sure no one came in. Then they found that strange thing in the sky above here.” He shook his head. “The conspiracy nuts came out of the woodworks fast. We had to turn away a bunch of them already, yelling that we were hiding aliens or something in here. These stupid kids must have snuck in to investigate. Place is too big for us to watch every way in.”

A couple of seconds passed before he went on. “You know, it’s strange that you turn up here again tonight while all this is going down. I think you know a lot more about what’s going on than what you told my colleagues who first found you. Care to fill me in?”

“I was actually just passing by on my way to the pub,” I told him honestly as I thought about how to answer. This problem was bigger than I could handle. I definitely needed help. The more he knew, the better. I decided to just give him the basics, though. No need to overwhelm him. “It has to do with that black hole in the sky you mentioned. It’s affecting this area, infecting all the living things within it and changing their behavior. It makes the animals extremely aggressive to the point they’ll attack anything. You have to put them down permanently or they’ll just keep coming at you.”

I noticed his head turn quickly to look at me. “Don’t worry,” I told him, guessing what he was thinking. “You’re fine. When I healed you, the infection was removed. We need to hurry and get out of this area, though, before the exposure to the atmosphere infects us both.”

I called out again. I was hoping to either attract the missing people or pull in any infected animals in the area. If I could draw their attention like I’d done with the koala, it might keep them from attacking the others.

“How do you know all this?” he continued questioning me. “And how did you really fix me up? I don’t know much about chikira or whatever it’s called, but I know there would be a lot more in the news about miraculous healing if it actually worked like that.”

“Now is probably not the best time to get into it,” I said evasively. He needed to know about the issues caused by the void energy. He didn’t need to know all about me, and I didn’t want to give away any more information than I had to. A sudden noise off in the distance spared me from having to answer more questions.

I know that noise, I thought, worried. A bush turkey. The little buggers were fast and could fly, and were pesky at the best of times. An infected one would be a handful. The call sounded again, this time closer. It must have detected us.

I turned to face the direction I thought it was coming from, moving my staff into my left hand and raising my right hand. “Get behind me and stay out of the way,” I told Brad firmly.

“I’m not going to…,” he started to say, moving up beside me, but I cut him off.

“It takes a lot of energy to heal someone of the infection,” I explained. “I don’t want to have to use that energy on you a second time when there are other people out there who need help. I can handle this.”

He didn’t say anything, and I thought he was going to ignore me and stay there. Thankfully, he moved back after several seconds. After giving it some thought, I passed my staff back to him. “Just in case,” I said. I heard him put his torch down before he took it.

I focused back on where I expected the turkey to appear. Once it entered my sphere of light, I wouldn’t have much time to react. That’s why I was planning on casting Light Dart. I didn’t think I could swing the staff quickly enough, but the magical spell would simply require a thought. It would mean revealing another of my abilities to Brad, but that was preferable to getting injured.

I focused intently and activated Determination, wanting every advantage I could get. My vision narrowed in on the area I was looking at as the world around me faded away slightly. I was hoping it would help control my racing heart and improve my aim. I was kicking myself for not trying it out in the dungeon when I was practicing on the skeleton. With my safety on the line was not the best time to find out what effect it would have on the spell.

The rustling of the brush alerted me just before the bush turkey entered the range of my glowing orb, running at full speed towards me. My guess as to where it was coming from had been off slightly, so I had to shift my position a bit. I moved my hand to line up with its fast-moving body and led it a little. I felt my Determination skill enhancing my focus and helping steady my arm. I cast the spell, and the dart shot out extremely quickly, but not quickly enough. If I knew more about birds, maybe I would have seen some telltale signs of what it was about to do and been able to adjust. As it was, I expected the turkey to keep running and aimed accordingly. However, it left the ground and came flying towards me. The dart impacted the dirt where it had been, leaving it completely unharmed. I knew I wouldn’t have time to fire another dart. My heart seized in fear as I raised my arms to protect my face.

“Down!” Brad yelled. Surprisingly, I didn’t freeze up and threw myself to the side. I heard a thud and something cracking. I rolled back to look at what had happened. Brad was standing there, holding the staff like a bat. The turkey was lying on the ground, legs feebly kicking but otherwise seeming unable to move. I’m glad I’m not the only one who uses it like that, was all I could think as I looked at the scene. I felt some amusement mixed with the worry I was sensing from Cax.

As I watched, Brad stepped forward and brought the bat down to put the turkey out of its misery. A quick thought to Cax resulted in disappointment. “No experience for the turkey,” he told me. I’d thought as much since there was no glow on the body letting me know I could loot it. I hadn’t hurt it at all, so it wasn’t surprising I got nothing.

I stood up and walked over to Brad, dusting myself off and glad I hadn’t kept my phone in my pocket after falling so hard. He was looking at the staff in appreciation. He handed it back to me and said, “Much better than my torch!”

I gave him a quick nod. “Thank you.” For saving me, and for not pointing out that I couldn’t handle it. I had to admit, I was impressed and a little envious. He had dispatched the threat without hesitation and didn’t seem upset that he’d just killed something.

“Let’s call it even,” he replied. “And as a bonus, I’m not even going to make you come up with a lie by asking what the hell you shot at that thing.” He retrieved his torch which was only good as a makeshift weapon now, and then moved to the edge of my light in the direction the turkey had come from. He stopped there and turned back to me. “Come on. The blood on the turkey was there before I hit it. I think someone is this way.”

I smiled wryly at what he’d said about my dart spell and looked at the bird on the ground. He was right. There was a fair amount of blood covering it, more than the blunt weapon would have drawn. So much, actually, that I didn’t like our chances of finding anyone alive at the end of this. Regretfully leaving another body unabsorbed, I moved over to where Brad was waiting and passed him, taking the lead with the light.

Doing our best to keep a straight line from where the turkey had appeared, we were rewarded a couple of minutes later as a couple of figures appeared at the edge of our bubble of light, lying on the ground. One of them was wearing a uniform. We ran over and Brad checked on his fallen partner while I checked on the other person. It was a young man. His throat had been savaged. His eyes stared unseeing at the canopy above.

I stumbled a few steps away and threw up, leaning one hand against a nearby tree. I thought I was becoming used to the sight of blood and dead bodies. They’d been animals and skeletons, though. This was a young man about my own age who had been viciously killed by a wild animal. It wasn’t just the gruesome sight affecting me. It was also the thought running through my head that it could easily be me lying there. I’d gotten lucky with the skeletons and managed to handle the sick animals so far. But next time…

My morbid thoughts were interrupted as Brad called out. “He’s got a pulse! Help him, please!” The desperate urgency in his voice helped me get a grip on my emotions and I focused on the fact there was someone here I could do something for.

I rushed over and immediately placed my hand on Brad’s partner. I cast Heal, using up almost all of my remaining mana. As the spell worked on the injured officer, I looked him over. He was a lean guy, probably in his thirties, and had multiple scratches on his face and hands. The main injury seemed to be a wound in his arm that had bled a lot and was still leaking a trickle of blood. I was guessing the turkey had gouged him there with its beak, judging by the rip in his uniform and the depth of the injury.

All the scratches closed up as the spell went to work, but the deeper cut on his arm didn’t close all the way by the time the magic was spent, although it did seem like the blood loss had stopped. I sat back on my heels, surprised to find that my magical healing had limits. I used the last of my mana to analyze him and was relieved to see that while he was still missing some health and the injury remained, there were no bleeding or infection debuffs listed. His name was also handily displayed.

As he started to stir, brought back by the repairs to his body, Brad slapped me on the shoulder and exhaled in relief.

I looked up at him. “Steve will be alright, but I don’t have enough energy to heal him completely.” And I wouldn’t for another ten minutes. I felt vulnerable, surrounded by the void-corrupted forest without any more mana for healing or defense.

“How do you know his …?” he started to say before cutting himself off. “Never mind. Thank you!” His intense eye contact made me feel uncomfortable. I stood up, escaping his gaze.

“Stay with him and fill him in on what’s happening,” I told him, wanting to get away from the attention. “I’ll look around to see if the last person we’re looking for is here.” I knew Brad had already checked on the dead man while I was healing his partner, so I didn’t need to tell him about that.

I couldn’t go far because I was the only one with a light. I checked the area as much as I could, but there was no sign of anyone else. I returned and found Steve sitting up, talking with Brad. When he saw me, he looked at Brad who nodded.

He slowly got to his feet with Brad’s assistance as I approached. As Cax had mentioned with the girl, that much blood loss would take time to recover from, magic or no magic. Not to mention he was still injured. Steve put out his hand. “I hear I have you to thank for being alive, if the crazy story I just heard is true. I know it’s not nearly enough, but cheers,” he said.

I shook his hand firmly. “Don’t mention it.”

“Nobody else around?” Brad asked.

I shook my head. “No.” I hesitated briefly before giving voice to what I was thinking. “Now, I know you’re not going to like this, but I think we should find a way out of here. Steve needs more help, and we need to get out of here before we become infected. I don’t have enough energy left to heal us again.”

Instead of arguing with me like I expected, Brad nodded slowly. “I don’t like leaving someone out here alone, especially now I know all the animals have gone crazy, but I think it’s best if we find a working phone and contact headquarters. They need to know what’s happening out here. A search party in riot gear with batons or something would have a better chance combing through here.”

I was surprised he agreed so quickly and wondered if my Persuasion skill had anything to do with it.

“Ok then,” I said. I looked over sadly at the young man’s body. “I don’t want to leave him here. By the time we can get someone to collect the body, who knows what the animals will have done to it,” I said softly.

“I don’t want to leave him either,” Steve said solemnly. “I tried to get that damn turkey away from his body, but it turned around and attacked me before I knew what was happening. Got me good, the little bugger. There’s something wrong with my gun, otherwise it would have been a different story.”

Brad quickly filled him on how the entire infected area of the forest appeared to be a deadzone for technology. Steve nodded along, his own experiences lining up with the explanation.

“I can try carrying him, but I don’t think I’ll be able to get him out of here on my own,” Brad said doubtfully, returning to the original topic with a gesture at the corpse on the ground. “And Steve is in no condition to help.” He looked at me questioningly. “Do you think you can lift him? We can trade off.”

With my improved strength now that I was level 3, I thought it wouldn’t be too difficult. I really didn’t want to carry a dead body around, but if it was the only way, I’d just have to put my discomfort aside. The thought of sparing his family the sight of him torn up any more hardened my resolve. Before I could say yes, Cax spoke up, startling me until I remembered only I could hear him.

“Actually, I believe the body will fit in your inventory.”

It hadn’t occurred to me that that could work, but it was a good idea. That way, we wouldn’t be encumbered and could defend ourselves quickly if necessary, and we wouldn’t be tired out by carrying the body. I looked at the two officers carefully. It would mean revealing another of my secrets, but at this point, what was one more?

“I’m surprised you would suggest this,” I told Cax quietly in my head. “I didn’t think you’d want me revealing another of my abilities just for something like this.”

His reply surprised me. “I think you have misunderstood my feelings on human life. Yes, I had no qualms about killing adventurers in my dungeon and absorbing their bodies. They knew the risks and chose to enter. I didn’t feel bad about their deaths, but I also didn’t revel in them.” He paused, and I knew he was looking at the body lying on the ground through my eyes. His tone softened as he continued. “As odd as I myself find it to be, I actually feel sympathy for this young man, caught up in a situation he didn’t deserve to be in. Perhaps it’s because this could easily have been my fate if you hadn’t found me. Normally, my only interest in a corpse would be what knowledge it could give me, but strangely enough, I too would like to see this boy taken out of this place.”

I found myself reassessing my opinion of Cax. His casual mentioning of people dying to his traps and defenders and then absorbing them had made me think he had no regard for life. Like he’d pointed out, it seems I’d been wrong.

“Thank you,” I simply said.

I walked over to the poor guy, crouched down and put a hand on him, trying to avoid his blood. I looked at the two police officers. “I’m not even going to try and explain this one,” I said tiredly with a shrug. I ignored their confused looks and willed the body into my inventory. It disappeared from the ground immediately.

“What the hell?! Steve stumbled back in shock, falling over. Brad muttered a couple of oaths and looked surprised, but not as much as I would have expected. I guess he’d seen plenty of strange things tonight already. Still, I was impressed by how well he was dealing with everything. What I didn’t like was the wary way he now looked at me.

Steve’s reaction took me by surprise. He got up and looked like he was going to come at me, a wild look on his face. Brad held him back easily, Steve not having the strength to push past. I couldn’t understand why he was so worked up. Actually, maybe I could. Seeing an entire person vanish would freak anyone out. On top of what he’d already been through tonight, it was probably more than enough to push him over the edge.

“What did you do with the body?” Steve demanded loudly, giving up on pushing past.

To help calm him down, I summoned the body back to its original position.

“It’s fine, see. It’s right here,” I reassured him. “It’s just an easy way to carry the body out of here.” He opened his mouth, but before he could speak, I said, “I’m not going to tell you how it works because you wouldn’t believe me, and it would take too long anyway. Remember, there’s still one more person out there that we need to get help for.”

Brad spoke to Steve quietly for a minute while I waited on them, keeping an eye out. I couldn’t hear what he said to him, but eventually, they both walked over to me with Brad supporting Steve.

“Brad here says you’re an alright bloke, and I know we don’t have time to be messing about, so for now I’m going to overlook the fact that you just made a body vanish and that you have a damn light following you around!” His voice got higher towards the end there. He took a couple of seconds to get a hold of himself before continuing. “But once we get out of this damn place, I want some answers.”

I didn’t bother responding beyond a nod, and he didn’t push it. We headed off, backtracking to the best of our ability and hoping we would come out of the woods somewhere close to where we started. It was slow going with Steve not at full strength. Brad had to help him so he wouldn’t trip over roots and fallen branches.

We stayed alert the entire way, our nerves fraying even further the longer we had to stay in the eerily altered woods, but weren’t accosted on our way back. Whether it was because we were lucky or because we’d killed the only animals still in the area and no others had moved in, I wasn’t sure. After some time, we passed back into green forest and Brad and Steve’s radios crackled to life. Steve’s torch also lit up again, but Brad’s remained dead. He’d probably broken it when he used it to fight off the koala. All three of us looked at each other, the relief clear on all our faces.

Brad immediately began relaying information back to whoever was on the other end of his radio, letting them know that we were heading back to the park with a body and that one person was still missing. He gave them a rundown on the dangers and advised special protective gear and weapons were needed before resuming the search.

We picked up our pace, eager to get out of the woods and knowing we were close to safety. We ended up coming up against the fence that blocked the forest off from the main road, so we followed it and finally came out right up near the carpark we were looking for. There were a lot of flashing lights visible through the trees.

“Is that much backup regular?” I asked curiously.

Brad looked at me, frowning. “Not at all,” he said.

I took the corpse out of my inventory, making it appear on the ground at my feet, and replaced it with my staff. I gestured at the body and looked at Brad. “Can you take him?” I didn’t want to resummon the body in front of a whole bunch of people.

He didn’t comment, simply picking the dead man up and slinging him over a shoulder. If holding a dead body bothered him, he didn’t let it show. I knew I wouldn’t be able to maintain my composure if I had to do it.

I took a deep breath before addressing both of them. “Before we go out there,” I began, “I want to ask a favor. Please don’t tell people about what you saw me do. I know it’s asking a lot, but I don’t want everyone to be looking at me like I’m a freak. Or to lock me up and do tests on me.” By the end, my voice was quiet and lacking in all confidence.

They both glanced at each other. Steve opened his mouth to answer, but Brad gestured for him to be quiet and spoke up. “You seem like a stand-up fella, weirdness aside, and you really helped us out, so I’m not going to lie to you. That’s not going to happen,” he told me clearly. “We need to let people know what it’s like in there, and there’s no way we can explain what happened without mentioning your …abilities,” he hesitated as he searched for a good word. “And to be honest, I think it’s better if you come clean about it all. You need to work with the people in charge to sort out whatever craziness is going on here.”

I must have looked pretty miserable because Steve threw me a bone. “Look. You freaked me out more than a little in there and I have no idea how you did what you did. But you saved my life, so I owe you. We can’t promise anything, but we’ll do what we can to keep a lid on your exact contributions. Brad’s right. We have to tell the higher-ups, but we’ll try to keep it from becoming common knowledge. Don’t forget, though, we still want to know exactly what it is we saw you do in there. Once this all gets settled, I’ll buy the beers and you provide the details.”

I’d hoped for promises that they would keep my secrets, but realistically that was never going to happen. They didn’t know me, and despite what Steve said, they didn’t owe me anything. This was probably the best I could expect. I didn’t bother to try and talk them around. I was pretty certain my low-level Persuasion skill wouldn’t be able to sway someone once their mind was made up, as theirs clearly were.

I gave them a nod to let them know I understood and then dismissed my orb. We walked out quietly towards the large group of people, each of us lost in our own thoughts. The decision to stop looking and leave someone behind in the forest all alone was weighing on me. But, as selfish as it was, the greater worry for me was what was going to happen now that my secret was out.