“Move.” Ryu’s chest heaved, and his mangled jaw barked the words out in ugly grunts. “Faster. Get across the river.”

They were running through the ruins of the Circle, sprinting towards the human districts across the river, but Ryu knew it was too late. He slowed down, letting the others get ahead of him. Solitude appeared in his hand.

“Ryu, come on,” Emiko said. She stopped when she saw the sword in his hand, but Fell grabbed her shoulder and pulled her forward.

“We’ll only get in his way. Come on,” Ryu’s companion said.

Ryu offered him a grateful nod. They continued sprinting, and he stopped in the middle of the street, popping a restoration pill into his mouth. Burning energy surged in his jaw and sore body. A temporary solution, but it was all he had.

They fell out of the sky with two loud crashes. Bulbous white sacs grew from the back of one Bug, and the other had a scorpion-like tail that rose from its back, its barbed end pointed at his heart. Both seemed fixated on his arm.

“Here for this,” Ryu said, waving his appendage.

The one with the tail issued forth a series of clicks that his mind translated into familiar dull tones. “Become Colony, and we will not harm you. The One has ordered us to offer you this, but I was also told to warn you: you may have conquered our pupae, but in doing so, you have taught the Colony much. The next humans will not be so fortunate.”

Ryu shrugged. “That’s unfortunate, I guess.”

The two started to circle him in opposite directions. “I am Sixty-Two, and that is Sixty-One. Goodbye, human.”

The whispers in Ryu’s head rose to a deafening cacophony, and he lifted his head to the sky. So, so close.

The talker moved first. It exploded forward in a burst of motion, its tail spearing towards his neck. Ryu ducked left. He felt movement at his back and spun about. The sacs along Sixty-One’s back had erupted, and small bugs swept towards him in a sea of twitching legs and snapping mouths.

He deflected another tail strike with Solitude, pinning the appendage to the ground in a blur of black smoke. The dead were positively wailing now, drowning out his world with their pleading calls. They needed him. He needed them. All he had to do was accept, and he’d become-

No. He wanted power but not like this. He struck out at Sixty-Two with a flurry of blows and made a decision. Ender’s way it was. Small legs crept over his body, and he rolled under the barbed tail, crushing the small bugs beneath him. A glance back told him Sixty-One seemed to be laying in wait.

Sixty-Two met his roll with a kick that knocked his shoulder back. The length of its tail slammed into his neck, and Ryu grunted and nicked it with Solitude on its retreat, raising a hand to his throat. [Whisper Step] carried him away from the sea of bugs at his back and towards his opponent.

He channeled Soul Eater, filling the cold smoke seep from his mouth. Not mindlessly, however. With precision. He and Ender had mapped out the timing from the planting of his foot to the twist of his hips. Memories rushed in and threatened to sweep him away to the land of the dead, but the sword had claimed his mind.

A cut emerged from his inky smoke, one faster and harder than any he’d dealt before. It crashed through the air at Sixty-Two’s carapace chest, the Bug’s barbed tail spearing past Ryu’s cheek. It was a cut perfect enough to make swordsmen weep.

And it failed. The scorpion tail grew, its carapace lining pulling apart and revealing a stretch of dark muscle beneath. The thing curved around and speared into Ryu’s chest. Pain filled him. He stumbled. His cut that was so perfect before bounced off of the Bug’s shoulder and into its arms.

The dead roared now, promising him life. Life through death, they said. Strength through their gifts. Forgiveness through action. Oh, how he wanted it. Blood filled his mouth, flooding it with a copper taste he knew well.

For the second time, Ryu denied the dead. He pulled himself off the tail, black coating his vision. He stumbled. Something hit his face. Then again. He fell. Small legs swarmed over him, biting and stinging as they went. They were in his hair. His ears. All over his face.

His arm burned. The toxins had reached it. Reached everywhere. He was dead. A disappointing end, if he was honest. Then the screen appeared.

Special Event Triggered

New Technique (Out of Class)- Splice

Mutated Arm (Xeros Body Hoppers) can now consume biological material to obtain temporary special effect that extends throughout the user’s whole body. Takes up one Technique slot. Must be Upgraded by consuming Xeros Body Hopper larvae.

He felt the burn extend from his arm and into his whole body. The paralyzing effects of the poison lessened, leaving him with only a gaping hole in the chest. Wonderful. The dead quieted.

The bugs continued biting him, but after a moment, they swept away. He felt steps near his head. His eye caught the hilt of Solitude on the ground near him. He prepared himself to move. An alien foot stepped near his head. Black smoke exploded.

Solitude pierced through the tail aiming at his head, shredding through its length in a spray of yellow and a glow of red. Ryu sidestepped the blow he knew aimed for his head and caught Sixty-Two with a kick that freed Solitude from its tail. He rammed his shoulder into the monster, his eyes meeting the large, soulless ones of his foe. A snap of his head with Soul Eater smashed one, and he pushed the monster away, stumbling from blood loss.

He never saw Sixty-One approach him from behind. The Bug’s axe-like weapon ripped into his hip and threw him sideways. He skidded across the stone, and then they were on him, smashing limbs and ripping bits from his flesh.

He used a bit of yellow ichor to renew the chitin armor on his arm and across the side of his body, shelling up beneath it. He tried to get up. Failed. Pain blackened his senses.

Golden light pierced the blackness behind his eyes, and Ryu looked up to see a familiar face behind the Bugs. Ash Malan, one of the Big Seven and a Ranked Lister, hurled globs of golden fire at the ocean of small bugs on the street.

Sixty-One and Sixty-Two turned to meet her, and Ryu grabbed Sixty-Two’s leg, pulling the monster to the ground in a puff of smoke. A blow crunched into his head, knocking his senses black for a moment, but he roared and pulled himself on top of the Bug.

His blood smeared over black carapace, and Ryu knew one of his lungs was pierced. Bleeding would probably do him in soon. He crawled, clawed, and pulled his way to Sixty-Two’s head. He shoved his chitinous arm into the mandibles clacking grip, pushing the monster’s head down and into the stone. He felt fire roar behind him.

“Headsman,” he snarled, feeling mana leave his body in a desperate rush. Instead of the large battle axe, a hatchet appeared in his hand. He buried it in Sixty-Two’s head, the Technique’s power using his enemy’s injuries to empower his own blow in a final execution. Sixty-Two shuddered once, twice, and a third time beneath him before falling still, the hatchet disappearing.

Ryu rolled off of the monster, gazing up at the empty sky. The black carapace armor fell off of his body like scraps, and heat burned his exposed flesh. He waited for death. It took its time.

He laid there, wheezing out shaky, fluid-filled breaths and waiting for minutes. Battle raged around him, as was so often the case, and he felt himself grow tired and weak, the seconds passing by like hours. Strange, he had always imagined death as a quick thing.

A dark silhouette appeared above him. He blinked his eyes a few times to clear his vision and hacked a wet cough. Dark blood leaked from the corner of his mouth.

“It is you,” Ash said, dirt and yellow ichor smeared across her dark skin.

Ryu fumbled a restoration pill from his storage ring and popped it into his mouth. No peaceful death for him, he guessed. Damn, so close, too.

“Aye,” he said, the pill stemming in the bleeding and stabilizing his condition.

“You’re Ender.”

He rubbed a shaking hand across his face. “I suppose.”

“Why are you here?”

“Same reason you are, I imagine,” he said, nodding over at Sixty-Two’s corpse.

Gold fire curled and licked around her hands. “And why shouldn’t I kill you? You murdered-”

“I know. We both know. So why don’t you do it? Kill me.” His words were a hoarse beg, and he spit out more blood to the side.

She shook her head. “You disgust me.”

“You don’t even know me,” he said, feeling light-headed. “If you’re not going to kill me, go on. I’ve got things to do.”

“More people to kill?”

“How many people do you reckon are dying while you sit here and patronize me? Your hands might be cleaner than mine, but they’re dirtier than innocent, I imagine. So go.”

She snarled. “I should’ve killed you when you attacked the Enchanters’ Guild compound.”

“Aye.”

“Fine,” she said, pulling him up by his arm. “I’ll take you to a healer, and then we’ll talk.”

“My sister-”

Her eyes pierced through him. “Like you could find anyone in your state. Besides, you’ll owe me after this, and like you said, innocents are dying. Time to clean your hands, aye?”

She carried him through the rubble of the Circle in a sprint, taking him over the bridge and into human territory. Ryu faded in and out of unconsciousness, her hurried steps jerking him awake. She stopped at one of the few remaining houses and kicked open the door. A man in armor stood behind it, a sword drawn.

“Hey, Michael,” she said. “Can you hand this man over to Taj for healing? Tell him to put him in a medical coma until I return, too.”

---

Michael took the murderer from her hands, and Ash sighed in relief. Her hands felt dirty. Why save a man like that? She had let him go months ago in Enchanters’ Guild territory to protect the citizens from their battle, but now? She could’ve killed him easily.

She thought back to the fight. She had heard them from a distance and seen them with her aura from even farther. Two Bugs, stronger than any she had seen, fighting one man. They were far from the Spire, which was curious, but she had thought little of it.

Still, watching them fight had made it clear the man was on her level of strength, and the black smoke that accompanied his movements were unmistakable, seared into her mind from their last encounter. When she was sure he was dead, she stepped in, using her fire to neutralize one of the Bugs’ Evolutions. Then he killed one of them, despite being half-dead.

She could only imagine his deathwish allowed him to push past his injuries, but perhaps it was a symptom of being insane. And then she saved him. Stupid, stupid. Always had to be the hero, didn’t she? Gods, she could use a drink. Or three.

She considered entering the house and finding her box of Dust, but the Circle still needed

her. Especially if all the Bugs were as strong as the one she had fought earlier. Her abilities were a direct counter to its own, and it had still managed to hurt her several times. Damned monsters.