He spent a long moment gathering his will, heating it up into flame upon the fingertips of his right hand, Firestream ready to cast at a moment’s notice.

Yet when he yanked open the ring, plunging his hands down to bathe the insides in a stream of fire, he saw not the fanged countenance of hissing, scowling goblins but the terrified blue-eyed gazes of girls, tied and bound, gazing back up at him in helpless terror.

Jack gasped, lurching back, horrified for what he had almost done, recognizing several of the faces in an instant.

“Susie! It’s me, Jack. Don’t worry about a thing, I’m going to get you out of here!”

Holding out a placating hand as if to assuage panicked screams, he drew his dagger to cut their bindings when he noted something that sent chills down his spine.

The girls hadn’t blinked.

Not one of them.

In fact, despite having their dark captivity abruptly broken by a familiar face, they hadn’t reacted at all. Their faces were still locked in those same expressions of terrified panic.

They hadn’t twitched a single muscle.

Not even to breathe.

Heart pounding so loud it was a roar in his ears, a shaky palm touched flesh that felt as stiff as a statue.

Like nothing alive.

His heart filled with unspeakable fury.

A killing rage.

Then he saw the rune.

Desperate hope warred with horror as he pricked the tip of his finger, gently caressing it over the glowing sigil upon Susie’s chest, sensing a degree of complexity he hadn’t felt from the other runes.

He swallowed, realizing for the first time just how perilous was the path he dard… yet knowing he had to do something.

Insight check made!

He freely bled his own life force into his bloody mark, more than willing to use his trump card to overwhelm and thus master this more sophisticated rune. He winced as he felt the accumulated experience and wisdom earned over the last day bleed into the power of his sigil.

But not his memories, thank goodness.

The world around him became a blur. He was naught but an extension of that exquisitely complex rune, a tool, he sensed, that could send any helpess, prone, or willing victim into a state of suspended animation.

A sigil once used for the gentlest of healing arts, perhaps, now twisted to the most nepharious of purposes.

Jack’s lips twisted in a furious snarl.

He was no fool.

He knew this rune should be beyond him. That he was taking a risk, daring to tear free forbidden knowledge once more.

But half a dozen lives were on the line.

“I would break this balm,

twisted intent, a healer’s woe.

Reveal the secrets I would know!”

A hot, suffocating pressure enveloped him.

An icy tingle of dread caressing his soul.

He did not hesitate, howling his challenge, roaring as he charged the foggy gloom suddenly all around him.

Beholding a massive wolf of smoke and fire.

Snarling its outrage, dripping blood from old wounds and drugged still, but far more potent and massive than it had ever been before.

Contest of skills engaged! This rune requires Apprentice Rank 1 or better skill level to successfully master, 3 ranks above your current level. -3 Penalty to Battle of Wills! Foe still partially drugged. Penalties cancel!

Jack roared and lunged for his throat, but this time his foe was ready, darting back and lashing out with sharp fangs that scored Jack’s ears.

Jack howled as pain seared his soul before snapping for his foe’s forelimb, biting deep and twisting, forcing his foe off its massive feet and earning a savage scoring of his back.

Jack fought back a scream of pain, his goal in sight, twisting himself free of fangs that scored deep bloody furrows on his back even as he bit into the soft vulnerable underbelly of his foe.

Tasting sweet hot blood as fangs of shadow and fury tore open his foe’s flesh, intestines spooling out of the wound.

The other wolf howled and stumbled away, but not before Jack tore free a mouthful of bloody knowledge, devouring lore far beyond his rank, howling with a pain that transcended the bloody furrows across his back as the knowledge seared itself into his brain.

You have successfully torn free knowledge beyond your ken!

You have suffered 30 damage and a Medium Wound! -3 to Physical skill checks until healed or battle fury (temporarily) negates penalty.

Arcane Perception is now Novice Rank 3.

Rune Forging is now Novice Rank 4

Rune Forging is now Novice Rank 5.

Congratulations! You have transcended Novice ranks! Rune Forging is now Apprentice Rank 1!

You have learned the Apprentice Ranked Rune: Suspended Animation. This rune will place any willing, comatose, or helpless target in a state of suspended animation. They will cease taking damage from any adverse conditions they are presently suffering. Metabolic functions cease. The body can be injured or healed. Injuries, past and newly inflicted will take their tole the moment the target is removed from suspended animation.

This ancient rune, once used by healers to stabilize wounded being pulled off the battlefield has been twisted to the most nefarious purposes by a flesh peddler more than happy to kidnap innocent girls. A flesh peddler determined to finish in real life what you thought ended in dream!

Perception check made!

Jacks heart lurched as he spun around, jolted from trance to violent wakefulness in an instant, arm raised on instinct alone as he stumbled back, screaming in pain as a violently swung blade chopped into his forearm. Jack shrieked as he felt bone give.

Armor successfully wards edge! Kinetic force cracks ulna!

You have suffered a lesser fracture!

“Treacherous worm!” A furious-looking Sven roared. “I’ll see you dead, maggot! Dead just like everyone in Hidden Valley will be when the goblin tribes flood in from the south, putting all those damned fools to the sword!”

Jack’s eyes widened, locking gazes with the snarling slaver.

His hunch had been right all along. This monster was the mastermind behind the nightmare plot that would have killed everyone jack loved.

Sven's muscles rippled with killing power, and Jack was surprised he had survived the blow without losing his arm in that instant he fell back among the group of comatose girls in the wagon’s vast internal compartment.

The falchion-like blade slashed for his throat but Jack had already fallen back, and Jack saw he wasn’t the only one caught off guard and wounded.

His foe’s face was a picture of fury and agony in equal measure, his shaking left hand holding in his own spooling entrails.

Jack tasted the salty tang of blood in his mouth, somehow certain that he knew the source. It was all he could do not to gag.

Sven snarled, flipping around his blade as he stumbled into the compartment after Jack, moving forward with surprising vitality for a man so gravely injured.

“You think I’m going to let you live after what you did, worm? You’re dead! The entire valley is dead!”

Jack stared death in the face, wicked blade held high to plunge into his skull where no exquisitely woven gambeson sown by his mother who was far more than any seamstress would protect him, knowing his time was running out.

“Scutum Glacies!” Jack screamed, a 3 foot diameter transluscent shield of ice now between them, quickly shattered by what would have been a killing blow.

Jack could smell his foe’s hot foul breath, mouth opening wide in a vicious smile as he plunged his blade a second time, this time under Jack’s armor, burying itself in his thigh.

You have suffered 15 Damage and a further Light Wound! Additional penalties negated for the duration of combat!

“I’m going to enjoy making you pay, maggot!” his nemesis spat, before Jack slammed a spear hand strike into his foe’ surprised mouth, knuckles scraping against rotten teeth, knocking out at least one.

“Ignis Fons!” Jack roared before his foe could even think of biting his fingers, and the world exploded into flame.

Save versus Arcane Peril Made! You have successfully cast Firestream in the heat of combat! Your Firestream has critically hit your foe, roasting him form the inside out!

Firestream is now Novice Rank 3!

Jack gazed with awe and horror as a stream of liquid flame exploded into his foe’s mouth, flash frying Sven's lungs, blasting through the back of his neck, frying his brain like eggs in a skillet.

Experience earned!

Jack instantly cut off his flame as dizziness, and sweet, sweet potency flooded through him.

Congratulations! You have completed the hidden quest: Missing Daughters III!

Half a dozen girls never went home the final night before the caravan’s departure. Only brilliant detective work executed in a quest chain you never followed would have led to the clues needed to stop this band of slave traders and cutthroats.

Either that, or trusting your gut instincts and chasing after the most questionable band of merchants you ever saw, just looking for trouble.

And you found it!

Experience Earned!

In that terrible, wonderful moment Jack felt a flood of power coursing through his veins. Power tasting of forbidden magics, did Jack dare to embrace what secrets this former Runeforger held tight to his soul.

You sense your foe’s spirit holding tight to the secrets locked upon his flesh. Secrets you are free to claim, if you dare! Do you wish to use earned experience to master additional blood runes? Y/N

Flashing a fierce grin despite his pain, Jack mentally shouted ‘Yes!’ as his psyche was slammed with alien memories not his own. The cold hard joy of scribing runes of power onto the helpless flesh of broken men under the hard-eyed gaze of a robed master who had taken in the bitter young man forever exiled from his home, doing all he could to heighten the lad’s anger and resentment that he could never find his way back, that he had been deemed unworthy ever to see his family again.

What had once been petty vindictiveness cloaking an otherwise unremarkable soul had been twisted with bitterness and hatred, Sven’s new master constantly reminding him of his rejection and shame even as he taught him the basics of rune forging, inspiring his contempt to spill over not only to those who wronged him but anyone who was weaker, anyone he could best or master.

Sven had been thrown from paradise into a world bitter and cruel, his master explained. He had been rejected by all who had claimed to love him, showing that all love was a lie. Love was weakness, a cruel delusion that had been used to trick and exploit him, then throw him away as if he were less than nothing.

His robed master fed the fires of his bitterness, his disillusionment, assuring his apprentice saw all of life through the bitterest of lenses until all Sven had left was hate and a desire for revenge. And together, he and his dark master would make Sven’s enemies pay.

For a few awful moments, Jack felt the man’s hurt and bitter pain. The betrayal he had felt to have been so utterly abandoned. But even as dark memory of that cloaked mentor’s sibilant lessons tried to worm itself into Jack’s soul, the blatant flaw in his nemesis’s logic was too blatant to miss.

If all of life was made up of manipulators and their victims, liars and those they deceived, oppressors and the oppressed, then why was Sven’s supposed mentor helping them?

By the very twisted logic he taught, Sven was just another pawn on his master's board. And if so, all his dark counsel should be seen in that light. Tools to manipulate a bitter fool into destroying the very home he had once wanted so desperately to return to.

His shadowy master bowed in approval when Jack mastered the flesh-runes of Strength and Vitality, feeling the tremendous surge of power flooding his thews at the cost of mana reserved.

“Well done, apprentice. Now you have the strength to carry out our mission and best all our foes!”

Jack smiled coldly at the vision, the memory that was not his own.

“Your apprentice is as dead as the fork-tongued lies you filled his head with. Thanks for the runes, though. I’ll make sure to use them to kill you when I get the chance.”

Jack felt a fierce sense of exultation with those words, feeling the last lingering caress of bile-laden hatred that had so infected the cloaked man’s lessons burn away as he claimed those memories and the power within for himself.

Congratulations! You have successfully learned the Flesh-Rune Strength! Forging this rune upon your body will increase your strength by +2 for a reservation cost of 10 Mana! (Arcane origins. This boost will have no adverse effects on your muscle growth or health.)

Congratulations! You have successfully learned the Flesh-Rune Vitality! Forging this rune upon your body will increase your vitality by +2 for a reservation cost of 10 Mana! (Arcane origins. This boost will have no adverse effects on your long term vitality.)

You have failed to learn the Flesh-Rune Charisma.(Insufficient experience remaining.)

You have failed to learn Binding Contracts. (Insufficient experience remaining.)

Note! Minimal level of Journeyman Rank 1 needed to learn Flesh-Runes!

Save versus warping made.

Congratulations! Runeforging is now Journeyman Rank 1!

Insight check made! You have cleaved free the knot of lies tainting your Dark Mentor’s lessons. Runic Lore now has neutral origins for you, and can be taught to worthy disciples with no risk of corruption.

Warning! Your unwitting Dark Master now recognizes another player upon the Board of Fate!

Jack’s eyes widened with surprise and alarm as the dark-robed figment of memory fading away from Sven’s dying gaze suddenly startled in alarm, pale yellow eyes somehow lurching forward, catching Jack’s own.

“You dare to cross me?” hissed the shadowy figure, a dream no longer.

But Jack had already pulled himself free of that vision, hoping to never taste the foul taint of that man’s mind ever again.

Only to groan, wracked by pain as he coughed from the thick smoke forming in the wagon, seriously injured with multiple cuts and abrasions, his foe’s charred corpse causing the compartment to smoke and burn.

For a moment Jack’s heart spike with panic, before common sense took over.

“Creo Aquam,” he whispered, grateful when he at last calmed sufficient to attune himself to the powerful currents of blue power all around him, shooting forth a stream of water almost effortlessly, the smoldering fires near instantly put out with a hiss of steam and yet more billowing smoke, worsening his cough.

“Creo Auram,” he whispered, expending another 5 mana over a handful of seconds as oxygen rich winds blowing into creation by the glorious power of magic and his will quickly blasted the smoke out of the compartment, replacing it all with fresh, clean air.

Then and only then, breathing easy and relieved that none of the girls in suspended animation were in immediate danger, did he do what he needed to in order to take care of himself, hoping desperately that the other two slave merchants were till under the effects of the sleeping potion he had fed all of them, Jack himself awake and alert only because he had dosed himself with one of his very few cure poison potions just before eating with them.

Jack groaned, presently prone on his back in a wagon compartment filled with half a dozen suspended passengers and one deep-fried Sven. It was all he could do not to vomit, forced to see up close the burned horror of his foe, once out of the furious heat of combat.

Jack turned his gaze, wincing as his back blazed with fire, alarmed to see blood still pooling from his injured leg, sensing his health points slowly, but surely, slipping away.

He closed his eyes, focusing on that spell that had been so painful to cast, yet had come to him like a surly hound that still knew its master.

Jack gritted his teeth and forcing healing magics into his body.

Twice, he nearly lost focus, before grabbing tight the reins of that wild power, depleting his remaining mana but staving off blood loss as the wound upon his thigh sealed itself. And as soon as his free mana felt recovered, he healed additional injuries, repeating that cycle over and over until at last he was whole, taking exhausted comfort in the prompts he received even as he shuddered with the after-effects of healing, which he knew would leave him feeling drained for the next hour or so.

Congratulations. Lesser Healing is now Novice Rank 2.

Congratulations. Lesser Healing is now Novice Rank 3!

He furrowed his brow, sensing the painful magics now coming to him just the tiniest bit easier. The awful visions and regrets of a life not entirely his own felt just a bit easier to endure. With a focused thought he pulled up his character sheet, noting the modifiers to his skill.

Congratulations! You now enjoy 15% Reduction in cost. 15% greater efficacy, and 15% decreased Exhaustion duration when casting Lesser Healing!

A quick check of his other arcane spells put an exhausted smile to his lips, noting the 15% decrease in cost and increase in damage for Firestream, also Rank 3. But that was nothing compared to the boon waiting for him when he examined the benefits of Journeyman Runeforging.

Congratulations! Your runes are now 90% more potent and harder to rupture. Cost to forge runes or rupture enemy runes is 53% of baseline, whether in the form of exotic ingredients or potency (experience point cost) if Bloodrunes are forged!

Jack waited for his mana to fill back to full before slowly exiting the wagon, Ice Shield leading, his Killer bee summoned once more. He shook his head, feeling foolish for not having readied it earlier. But to be fair to himself, he had been juggling many balls that night.

He couldn’t help grinning ruefully. Grateful as he was to have learned multiple useful runes, he was all too aware of how close he had come to losing himself in those mad contests of the mind. As to what would have happened if Sven had bested him, or if Sven's dark mentor had successfully corrupted him, it didn’t even bare thinking about.

As it was, he had still paid a mighty cost, the mastery of those runes eating not only the quest experience he had earned that night, but a good portion of the experience he had earned the previous day as well.

Earlier, he had sensed the shimmering blue bar of his experience meter coming very close to maxing out Level 1. Now, it was almost empty. But that was fine with Jack. He knew he had a lot to learn before he dared claim a class that he would be bound to for life. Until then, it could only help to gain proficiency with as many skills as he possibly could, so he’d be able to develop in ways far beyond the limitations of any one class.

Even if it would normally take so much training that years would pass, he could only hope that he would achieve his goals a damn sight faster with the experience he would gain from putting his life on the line adventuring, to say nothing about the advantages of a former Walker of the Path of Eternity, now daring the Path of Peril.

Jack took a deep breath of crisp night air, tasting the lingering scents of scorched wood, burnt flesh, and pine resin wafting through the nighttime breeze, catching sight of the faintly rustling forest just beyond the embers of their camp fire. And much to his relief, Otto and Linus were exactly where they had crashed in slumber, neither preparing to attack Jack from ambush.

Then he frowned, sensing something wrong.

Ice shield and killer bee at the ready, Jack slowly approached Linus, hissing when he saw what was wrong.

The young pock-marked man was not lost in the throws of slumber, but death.

His eyes were open and bulging, both his hands covering his abdomen.

Ruptured and covered with dark runes that seemed to pulse and twist. Foul things that Jack had no interest in learning.

And when he peered at Otto, he saw the same.

Jack shook his head.

It made sense now, assuming those final dreams of wolves battling for power and life had an echo of truth. Jack had woken to the burning agony of his gnawed-upon back.

And Sven had woken to complete disembowelment.

Yet though he had still been holding a perforated abdomen, the injury had been nowhere near as severe as it could have been.

Should have been.

His dead foe had no doubt used some foul rune to steal the life-force of his own companions.

“Serves you bastards right,” Jack said aloud, but the rictuses of agony upon their faces diffused whatever lingering hate he might have had. Had Jack not overheard what he was now certain was Linus gloating over the doom of the valley as he and Sven let loose that pair of scouts Jack had put down, he might have even felt pity.

He frowned in sudden thought, realizing the obvious.

He had found the hidden compartment of one wagon, but not the second.

Additional wine jugs carefully removed, he found the pair of runes that set his heart racing, carefully destroying them before lifting open a second trap door.

Beholding a pair of goblins that were deathly still.

Frowning, he carefully prodded one with one of the slaver’s claimed swords, but it didn’t move, or bleed when he nicked it.

Jack didn’t hesitate to grab the four feet of hateful green spite, tying it carefully with rope Sven’s caravan had had in too plentiful supply before carefully inspecting the body and removing the rune he had expected to find.

And when hot yellow eyes widened in sudden confusion, they were met by tightly bound ropes their owner had no hope of untying, and the determined gaze of a man who would stop at nothing to protect the people he loved.

The pair of fierce-looking goblin crumpled, whimpering.

Jack’s smile turned icy-cold, his right hand erupting in flame.

“There are two ways we can do this. You will each tell me exactly what Sven and your chieftens were planning. You will whisper the answers to my questions. If your answers match? I will give you each a sip of wine. If they don’t?”

Jack clenched his fist.

“You will burn in fire.”

Congratulations! You have learned the skill interrogation. When polite questions just won’t cut it, cut them instead! Successful use of this skill will allow you to intimidate your foes into confessing what they most want to keep hidden. Clever use of this skill will keep desperate lies told to appease you to a minimum.

Interrogation is now Novice Rank 4. - You clearly have a knack for this!

***

The sky was lightening by the time Jack was finished, chilled by what he had discovered.

Apparently, besides being a starter zone, Hidden Valley’s powerful wards served the dual purposes of warding off invasions from northern tribes of orcs, goblins, and worse, that had been threatening the human kingdoms centuries ago.

It also served as a sanctuary of sorts for former adventurers and their descendants, many of whom had earned any number of enemies over years of questing and intrigue, more than happy to put their past behind them and, of course, lend the power of their skills, should their valley ever be put in peril.

Though several villages and many farms dotted the valley, for some reason Jack had never ventured much beyond his own, so he only recognized a few of the girls he had rescued. But the tactical significance of the area was clear even to him.

So long as those ancient wards held, the northern tribes would find breaching the southern lands all but impossible. It had only been with the help of his shadowy master that Sven had gained access to any goblins at all, and it was only because of the shadowy figure’s perversion of his Runic arts and Sven’s own past as a former citizen of Hidden Valley that Sven had been able to cross the barrier at all.

Geyser Novice Rank 2 achieved.

Firestream Novice Rank 4 achieved.

Firestream Novice Rank 5 achieved.

Jack took a deep breath, gazing at the pyre before him, waiting for his mana to fully recharge once more.

He had decided to dispose of his enemies in the most expedient way possible, consigning them to ash and flame while skilling up his Firestream spell, enjoying the increasing ease with which he could cast his spell and the minor boost in potency to his flames. At Novice Rank 5, his firestream was 25% more destructive, 25% cheaper to cast, and rapidly getting to the point where he could channel the spell as effortlessly as he could swing his newly claimed sword.

Practically speaking, his accuracy had also improved as he incinerated the corpses, practicing the arcane equivalent of the spin and strike technique, darting around and blasting his would-be opponent right in the face and throat, where a stream of fire would be at its absolute most effective. Fire that might leave a serious burn if shot at someone’s belly would be downright lethal if shot at someone’s face, bypassing all armor save a hastily raised shield, most likely blinding them and searing their lungs.

And for all that he had terrorized the would-be goblin raiders, he had been merciful. After the goblins had spilled their matching stories, he had placed them both in Suspended Animation once more, as they met the helpless and prone requirements, before eliminating them.

As savage as the scene might look, burning the slavers and goblins to ash after he had used Geyser to drench the nearby grass and trees, the only human he had killed had been in self defense, and the pair of goblin scouts hadn’t felt a thing. And by the time he finished working up a sweat burying the ash and shattered bone with the help of the latrine pit shovel all wagons carried, the air was alive with the chirps and trills of a bright new dawn, and Jack knew it was time for him to do what he had been putting off for far too long.