Burn… body… no…

Escape…

Must… escape…

Child… come… closer…

Wisteria felt the urge to scoot closer. She had to find a normal piece of flesh to touch so she could truly give him rest. She kept the small gold bird skull in her left hand as she leaned forward with her right outstretched. Her fingertips glowed with the barest hint of holy energy, not a spell, just a sensation, a touch of energy to share with the world for her piety.

Perhaps it was the lingering effect of the buff that saved her. Perhaps it was her goddess. Either way, Wisteria let out a shrill shriek as she felt something against her ear.

Everyone else jerked to attention and stared at her, not knowing what was wrong.

She tore at her right ear and ripped out a slimy black grub, tearing and bloodying herself as it took a strip of skin with it from her ear to the corner of her jaw. Still holding the thin triangle of flesh in its tiny claws, she spiked the eldritch grub into the ground. With a scream, a mixture of pain and panic, Wisteria grabbed an arrow and repeatedly stabbed the grub.

[Eldritch Taint Grub - Level 107 has been killed.]

[System unlocked.]

[Calculating contribution and bonuses.]

[Bonus EXP has been gifted due to solo-kill.]

[…]

[…]

[…]

[Calculations complete. Rendering rewards.]

[Creating status window.]

[Level up! - 2]

[Level up! - 3]

[Level up! - 4]

[Level up! - 5]

[Level up! - 6]

[Level up! - 7]

[Level up! - 8]

[Level up! - 9]

[Level up! - 10]

[EXP cap reached. Please choose a class.]

[Status]

[Wisteria O’neah]

[Level: 10]

[Class: None; Classes Available]

[Core: Middle White]

[Mana Pool: Small]

[Physical Condition: Child, fit]

[Stats]

[Skills]

[Titles]

She cut the thing into mince, jabbing the arrowhead into the ground again and again, well past when she got the notifications. Blood was flowing down her neck, coating the collar of her shirt and mixing with her tears.

Wisteria only stopped once Blas gripped her by the shoulders and pulled her against him. “Wisteria! Wisteria it’s okay! It’s gone. It’s done. You’re okay. Breathe,” he said, squeezing her tight, “I’m sorry. I should’ve seen you. I should’ve known.”

“Th… there’s… you…,” Wisteria stuttered between sobs, dropping the ooze-covered arrow, “Y…you couldn’t have… have known… He… Alister, he got his notification.”

He pet her hair, “Shhh… it’s okay. You’re right. We couldn’t have known. I should have been more careful though, I shouldn’t have gotten distracted with Alister while we’re still out here. Wisteria, you’re bleeding. Let’s get you bandaged up and let’s go back to town so we can get a healer for you… Alister, use a spell and burn the corpses.”

Alister was stuck staring at Wisteria and his father in shock. He hadn’t even had time to do anything about it. He was angry at himself, too, that he was so distracted by this fancy new toy that he didn’t think of a parasite or something strange like that. When Blas told him to burn the corpses, he just nodded, firmly enough to make himself a little dizzy. “Blaze,” he said, holding a hand out after he walked up to it.

From his palm, there was a glowing red light that had no projectile, but the bodies caught fire as a blue spell circle encompassed them from below. Alister kept it going until naught but ash was left.

Wisteria was still sniffling and crying as Blas cleaned her off and pressed a bandage against her face. He looked toward his son, “You got any healing spells?”

Alister shook his head, “Not really… I know technically how to, but I focused mostly on destruction, not creation. I have some very mild healing - like one good for a hangover.”

“I’ll… I’ll be okay,” Wisteria sniffled, “It’s ok. I’m not dying or, or something.”

“No, but sweetheart, it might leave a scar,” Blas smiled, patting her hair before he scooped her up and placed her back onto one of the horses, “You wouldn’t want a scar on your pretty face like that. Your mother would be rather disappointed with us if it did. Not to mention my wife, too. You can ride with me, just in case you get dizzy or something.”

“Oh. One of the taints died?” a voice said, echoing throughout a vast empty space only populated by an arching crescent chair with someone inside it. The voice sounded like it was speaking underwater. It warbled and rattled, flittering between a deep hiss and an old radio, “Hah. How cute… and by a child at that… I like it.”

The entity was looking at a blackened sphere of blood that floated limply in front of it. The orb squirmed, looking to be made of skinned fingers and clotted blood, mixed with a variety of viscera. It chittered information in a strange language from no visible mouth.

“Wisteria O’neah… hm? The Duke there might be problematic. No father. An only mother. Hmm… interesting. Interesting indeed. My little Spleq, what do you think I should do? I think I should play the long game. Might be fun, mm?” it shifted in its chair, allowing long shadowed hair to fall forward past its shoulders. A hand reached out and plucked a mangled finger from the ball. Sinew oozed out and a string of gunk stretched like a suspension bridge before it dropped down.

The entity in the chair brought the finger to its face, and for a moment, crunching and chewing, all manner of sounds of mastication reverberated through the strange space. It grabbed another finger as though from a bowl of chips and grabbed the skinned digit with its teeth by the fingernail. The nail ripped off, pulling until the connections snapped, and the thing crunched down on that first. Following that, the entity sucked bloody flesh off the bone, not unlike a piece of chicken.

“Delicious… Remind me to get more of this… varietal,” it stood, showing itself to be an androgynous person, flat as a board but with a feminine face. Their hair was straight and long enough that it touched the ground in this loose state, pitch black enough that it looked like the void. The hair looked wet, too, dripping with black droplets that fell down into the floor of the empty space and rippled, showing the ground to be made of some sort of liquid.

Pale as moonlight, with eyes as dark as their hair, they looked back to the finger sphere, “Time to take a trip…”