Chapter 7

???-POV

“Where the hell is she?” A grumpy looking guy stalked around the forest searching for a particular elven girl, as a wet snow fell steadily.

“The hell if I know! The tracks just stop by another pair of tracks, then there’s just nothing… Can’t we just go back already? What if an air mage took her, which would explain the sudden lack of tracks?” A pale looking girl crouched in the snow observing the trampled path before them.

“What, and let that wench get away with a fire-stone? Those are worth over two hundred gold, and you’re just giving up like that? Not to mention how much food it could trade for at the moment!”

“Ummm… actually, yes! If you hadn’t noticed, I’m a damn fire mage! If you feel cold as a water mage, then I feel like a flipping popsicle.”

“I guess you have a point.” He looked down at his frost bit toes, idly yearning for a warm pair of boots.

“Would you guys just shut up already? If you have enough energy to complain like that, then you have enough energy to keep looking.” A tall kid stood in a clearing to the side, observing the valley before them, as the others argued.

“Shut up Ed, you’re not the leader or some crap. Come on Lina, let’s check if she backtracked.”

Saying this, the other boy started walking back along the trail towards camp, ignoring the other boys reddening face.

“Where do you think you’re going?!” Ed, who was at least thirty yards away, suddenly flickered. Appearing a few feet in front of the other boy, he grinned as he shoved a short sword up against the boy’s neck.

“Woah! Calm down man, we’ve known each other since we were kids.”

“What’s that supposed to mean here? This is a competition, and if you’re not willing to contribute to my team, you can contribute with your life!” With that said, the rage filled blade slashed outward, cutting a rough line in the boy’s neck with the dull blade. In all reality, the blade was extremely dull from so much bush-whacking, to the point it almost did more crushing damage than cutting.

The other boy fell to the ground wheezing as blood gushed between his fingers, trying to stem the bleeding. Alas, he was already starting to drown on his own blood, as a strangled cry was escaping his lips.

For a moment, Ed stared dumbfounded at the scene before him. Then, slowly a grin crept up his face, settling in to give a grim image of betrayal. All this time Lina hadn’t moved, as she expected Ed to try reasoning with his friend at least a little.

Alas, Ed had gone over the line, and was desperate for more score points at the end of the exam. In his mind, if he couldn’t kill others for points or take over a position effectively, he’d just get what he needed out of his peers.

Ed was enjoying the view, as his now struggling friend scrabbled around in the snow dieing the area crimson, when the ground suddenly lifted out from under himself.

Snow cascaded to the sides practically burying Ed, while Lina stood stunned as a lively green light shone from the hole in the ground. Then, a person’s head suddenly appeared followed by a weirdly dressed body. The boy took a few steps outside to fully open the hatch, when he suddenly noticed the blood everywhere.

Glancing around once, he was greeted by the disturbing scene around him, and a girl staring at him in astonishment. Pausing in his step, he pulled out a machete, struggling with the strap on the handle for a moment before it came free.

*Cough* “So… we finally meet.” The mysterious boy shuffled nervously, trying to find a comfortable stance to defend himself.

“What?”

“I knew you blood thirsty freaks would come at some point, but I didn’t expect to stumble upon this right outside my front door-.”

Before the boy could continue speaking, a disheveled Ed clambered out of the new snow bank gasping. Upon spotting the cause of his troubles, he sent a slash towards the boy immediately.

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Ken-POV

Ken was distracted, thinking over why the snow was so heavy on his trap door, when a scene straight from a horror film appeared right in front of him at eye level. A pale girl stood motionless, while a suffering guy rolled around spraying blood everywhere in little spurts from his neck.

My first reaction was to dive back into the cave, but the chase was up now. If he let one get away, they could bring others to raid his base. Hence, why his next best decision was to eliminate the new adversary before it was too late.

She was obviously a bad person, having literally killed someone on his doorstep, just for a competition. So he had little qualms ridding the world of someone like her.

“So… we finally meet.”

“What?”

“I knew you blood thirsty freaks would come at some point, but I didn’t expect to stumble upon this right outside my front door-.” Suddenly, a glimmer appeared in his peripheral vision as he heard someone gasp for air.

Unthinking, he dove to the side, ducking under a sword slash. He didn’t fully escape though, as a crimson line appeared on his back, running straight down his spine.

Thankfully, the damage wasn’t debilitating, while the adrenaline numbed the pain. Stumbling through the snow, he tried turning around in time to meet the next strike, only for a fireball to fly past his head.

The smell of burning hair filled the air around him instantly, while he was once again distracted by a short sword flinging in his direction. This time though, he managed to bring a clumsy swing up to defend. The heavy machete plowed through the small sword, ricocheting to the side, barely missing Ed’s shoulder by an inch.

The girl powered up another flaming attack in the next instant, launching a fiery lance of pure fire in their direction. Thankfully, she was a novice, having poor control of her spells. This caused the lance to hit the ground at their feet, instead of his body.

Steam rolled into the air, snow melting instantly. In the poor visibility, he just barely managed to deflect the next flurry of stabs directed at his heart. Unfortunately, he couldn’t evade every strike fully, quickly accumulating a variety of thin cuts over his arms.

His only saving grace was the extremely thick machete, easily setting his opponent off balance even with his untrained swings. Not to mention he was actually fairly strong for his body size.

Alas, he would not have survived the next attack if Selene didn’t come running out of the cave with her bow at the ready. Upon exiting the hole, she was right beside the other girl, who was in the middle of preparing a series of fireballs.

Too close to fully draw her bow, she threw it aside and made a mad grab at the girls waste. Going down in a ball of limbs and hair grabbing, they immediately commenced a deadly game of scratching and biting.

Thankfully Ed was just as distracted by the scene as Ken was, because otherwise he would’ve been dead in but a moment. As it was, they turned back as one and continued the fight in earnest.

Without any interference, they were both engrossed in a game of blades. The silver sheen of iron and steel flickered intermittently, sometimes landing a shallow cut, other times a series of screeching metal met the ears as their forceful swings collided.

Neither boy was an expert swordsman, as it showed immensely. Some of the moves they pulled would’ve been utterly stupid if they weren’t both fighting the same way. If a true swordsman saw the fight, they’d be amazed actually… normally you’d just end up hurting yourself fighting like they did.

There was no technique in this fight. Just pure reaction and a fight for survival. Both boys had a few wounds, but Ken undoubtedly held most of the gruesome wounds.

This was especially true when the other boy started using a weird magic to increase his speed gradually. What he didn’t know, was that if Ed had more time to prepare his burst of speed, Ken would undoubtedly have joined the other young man on the ground bleeding out immediately.

It was truly fortunate how hot-headed Ed was, to rush into the fight so unprepared. In the end though, Ken was not fast enough to compete with Ed’s slowly increasing speed. Hence it was no surprise when a flurry of slashes ended in him losing his index finger, while his Machete went flying, before embedding itself in a tree.

The shock of the moment also allowed Ed to get a quick bash in with the pommel of his sword, causing Kens head to whip back before he fell to the ground dazed.

“It was a good try, but you’ll never be my equal. Hahaha, taste blade dumbass.*Cough*” Just as Ed was about to end Kens life, the blade stopped mid-air where he was preparing to plunge the tip into his skull.

Unfortunately for Ed though, there was a third member to Ken’s team. Although Lapillus was unfortunately small and weak, she still had a few cards up her sleeve. As Ed was saying his little speech in arrogance, she launched herself from a tree nearby, gliding through the air in an unsteady flight.

Landing on Ed’s back, she clambered for his shoulder before decisively attempting to rip his throat out with her sharp young teeth. Even though she had few teeth at her age, they were plenty good enough when it came to ripping out arteries.

Crimson sprayed into the air at high speed from his rapidly beating heart, as both Ken’s and Ed’s eyes widened as far as they could go. Ed then proceeded to rip Lapillus from his neck causing more damage to himself as he threw her aside in anger.

This knocked Ken from his stupor, and then gave him enough time to slam a foot into Ed’s knees, pushing him away. There was an audible crack of bone or tendon, and the unfortunate boy fell to his knees.

Not taking any chances, Ken rushed to his feet whipping out his Bolo knife. Proceeding to stab it into Ed’s Chest as many times as possible before he could react. At first, Ed’s struggles increased, but I kicked the sword out of hands reach before pinning his upper body to the ground. By the time I was done stabbing Ed, I felt a weak hand rest on my shoulder, breaking me from my trance.

Selene was a terrible sight, covered in welts and scratches everywhere. Glancing at her adversary, I almost threw up at the sight of her neck bent at an odd angle. That was before I looked back down at my own handiwork, and realized Ed’s entire chest was a series of stab wounds. My clothes were ruined, and blood flowed freely from numerous cuts all over my body.

I leaned to the side and chucked up everything in my stomach. Great, now I was covered in blood, wounds, and my own vomit. How could going out to check a fish trap, go this wrong?

The slope where I’d previously terraformed into a beautiful garden, was now a clearing devoid of grass, snow or plants. Fires sputtered where the fire mage had missed and my acorn bearing oak tree was scarred severely. Half the tree was practically incinerated, while the top branches were slowly being put out by the new snow falling.

Another storm was coming, and it seemed colder than anything previously. Breaking from my observations, I checked the bodies of our assailants, before dumping their rigid bodies under the ice at the deepest part of the stream.

In all we collected a few leather bags, some jerky rations, a book and a velvet pouch with some random colored stones inside. The short sword Ed used previously was trash, but he stowed it away for materials, along with the bolo knives from everyone else.

Selene looked over the other girl’s remains, keeping another larger book and whatever else she found. We mutually just grabbed the stuff from the people we killed respectively, and I grabbed the other boys’ things since my fight was decidedly harder.

After we finished up with the bodies, Selene followed me back inside while a somber feeling pervaded the atmosphere. Honestly, I didn't really care what Selene did when we got inside, because I was too busy trying to patch up the wounds on my own body.

After brewing a simple astringent, I cleansed the wounds I could reach before wrapping spare cloth over the largest open wounds to stop myself bleeding out. After that, I ate a little and promptly fell asleep in my room, Lapillus held tightly to my chest for warmth.

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Selene-POV

‘I can’t believe my luck! How the hell did they track me this far? It’s just one essence stone anyway, they had bags of ‘em back at their camp!’ When Selene was still trying to group up with others, she’d originally run into a big camp near the mouth of the little ravine. They took her back to their camp acting nice and everything, as if she could join them to survive, acting as if they were the same as her.

But she was wrong, they weren’t nearly as weak as her. It was a good thing elves had good hearing, because another kid evidently tried impressing another girl in camp b flaunting their plans when she was walking through it.

A girl from a family with deep ties in blood magic, evidently planned on sacrificing her on an alter she had made inside their camp. In retrospect, she was already dubious of their intentions, seeing how readily they accepted her into their group. Not to mention how nice their camp was.

There were a few cabins, some tents set up in neat lines, and about a hundred kids spread out around the edge of the hills for the last mile or so. Maybe they planned on trapping and hunting the other kids stuck in the mountains deeper in. or more likely just trapping them where they couldn’t escape the coldest winter terrain.

The barren mountain peaks, cliffs and sparse hunting grounds made for an unappealing place to live an entire month.

Looking back on it, she could see how they all obviously planned this out before the event even started. It wasn’t uncommon to group up before the exam, but it was uncommon for such a big group to do such a thing.

It made hunting the other competitors harder, and it was harder to meet the needs of everyone. Food, shelter and prizes were argued over heavily unless there was a leader to dictate who got what.

Long story short, she grabbed some of the supplies in the middle of the night before the guard on duty noticed, and bolted for the hills. She hadn’t intended to rob the essence stone from them, but the temptation was too much when it was in arms reach.

Honestly speaking, she might not have been hunted down if she hadn’t taken the essence stone. Alas, she made a huge mistake and they were ordered to track her down in the upper mountain ranges past the barrier line.

Glancing at Ken’s room, Selene worried over his wounds. While she’d escaped her fight relatively undamaged, Ken was covered in seeping bandages. When she tried helping him with his wounds earlier, he moved away from her to clean up by himself.

Munching on a fruit from the table, she attentively watched the heavy stone door at the entrance. ‘Did I cause Ken all this trouble?’ Selene’s thoughts turned darker and darker, as she thought over further implications of her staying with him.

‘Maybe I should leave? No, that wouldn’t do any good. Ken’s too weak to defend himself now, and I would die out there.’

As the day faded into night, Selene sat guard over the door, pondering her circumstances until she unknowingly passed out by the smoldering fire place.