Individuals who take Adventurer style jobs without being connected to the guild are colloquially known as Tomb Raiders in many areas, though their name can vary wildly. This name came from their willingness to deal with more legal and moral grey area and their general disinterest in anything unlikely to make them more money. Adventurers have another name for them. Gamblers. – History of a New Age, pg 49

Elijah had made significant progress in fighting Ghoul Raptors, Ghoul Fox, and Ghoul Boars. While still dangerous opponents that required him to pay attention while fighting, they were no longer an opponent that required everything he had to defeat. Unfortunately, this wasn’t entirely due to an increase in his own personal power.

He had grown quickly when dealing with the lesser beasts of the forest, swiftly identifying weaknesses in his combat style and improving his usage of his spells. That had slowed significantly. Now most of his improvements came from recognizing the patterns these monsters followed instead of deficiencies in his own actions.

He could easily identify when a Ghoul Boar was about to charge by the tilt of its head. When a Ghoul Fox was about to cast a spell by the way in held itself. When a Ghoul Raptor was planning to charge by how it placed its desiccated wings. He had fought so many of them, but they simply could not provide the challenge he needed to improve his combat style anymore. He knew them as opponents far too well.

He couldn’t simply move on to Ghoul Deer and Ghoul Badgers either. They would tear him apart. Each of these creatures were strong enough to contend with a Ghoul Boars charge, fast enough to avoid a Ghoul Raptors strikes, and had magical abilities at least on par with a Ghoul Fox. They were, in effect, the greatest danger in The Forest of the Final Sleep. The as yet unseen apex predators might be more powerful, but they were far less numerous than these lesser kin. Even the Ghoul Badgers, which were far more solitary in nature then the Deer, had been sighted by him on two dozen or so occasions, while these other creatures had yet to be seen alive.

His guess was that their sheer size necessitated a far smaller population. The Badgers were perhaps three feet tall, seven feet long not counting their tail and bulky. Probably wider than they were tall. The deer were maybe as long and a half a foot taller, but far less compact than the badgers. While the deer were maybe one hundred pounds, the badgers were likely closer to one hundred and fifty pounds.

By comparison, as far as he could tell the smallest of the apex predators were the pack creatures that he believed to be wolves. Those were at least twice as large as the Ghoul Deer based on that skeleton from the river. Who knew how large the bear was? Big was the best he could do. The forest simply could not support many things that size.

With all that in mind, if Elijah could improve to the point where the Badgers and Deer were not a threat he should be fairly safe. At least in this part of the dungeon. That level of strength felt like the bare minimum amount of power he would need to safely advance deeper into the forest too.

If he couldn’t survive these comparatively numerous predators, relying on simply hiding away until daylight to escape them, what would he do when he made it to winter? His progress would be incredibly slow. He would need to create more secure hiding places as those threats were given more and more time to track him down.

If he was slowed down, would he still be able to survive? Would he be able to move around, hunting the creatures he was capable of handling? He would need to. Killing the lesser monsters would be the only way to secure the Evolution Points he needed to survive when fruit and meat was no longer available. On top of that, if entering winter quickly trapped him in place was there even a point to pushing further into the dungeon?

No, he needed to be strong enough that only extraordinary dangers would force him to flee. He needed to reach that next tier of danger and what he was doing wasn’t working. His first thought was to start limiting himself in his fights. Only allowing him to use certain spells, or only so many spells. Fighting without his most powerful weapon, his Blood Roil Aura. The question was, would that be enough? He would have to see.

#

Fighting without Blood Roil Aura was far more difficult than he had anticipated. He knew the spell was strong. A cornerstone to his entire fighting style. He still had underestimated his reliance on it. Thanks to Blood Roil Aura he only had to survive and stay close. If he did, the spell put his opponents on a deadline. A hard limit on how long they had to beat him before they were simply incapable of continuing. He didn’t realize just how much he leaned on his opponents’ slowly reducing abilities to overcome them.

This was especially true of the Ghoul Raptors and Boars since they fought at close range. He knew he couldn’t compete with the Boars in strength, but he thought he had been their equal in endurance. Their equal if not their superiors in reaction speed and agility. That illusion was quickly shattered. Without the debilitating effects of his aura, they could keep charging far longer. Even when they did eventually decide charges were a waste of energy, their goring flicks of their heads and swipes with their claws were far more coordinated than he was used to.

Thankfully, his blood drinker armor meant he could still fight in his most comfortable style. Slowly debilitating his opponent as his armor drank away their blood increased his damage and improved his defense as the fight went on. It was just a lot slower. That meant there was less room for error and he had to be more conscientious of every move he made.

It was exactly what he needed. Combat that would punish him for sloppy actions or bad assumptions. A change that forced him to pay attention to his opposition again. It also forced him to attack his opponent while they were still at full strength, as his armor wouldn’t really begin to work until they were already injured.

Of course, fighting without the Blood Roil Aura was not his only training method. He cycled through any and all restrictions he could think of, forcing himself to grow rather than simply adapt to these common opponents. A constantly shifting handicap to keep himself off balance and fighting in unfamiliar ways. Once he even limited himself to a ten-foot radius circle, forcing himself to stand and confront his foes rather than dance around them while hiding behind cover.

That had been risky, but the growth had been worth it. The system didn’t take his self-imposed handicaps into account, so he did not receive more Evolution Points. The monsters themselves were not any stronger, so he received the same number of Experience Points too. He did, however, see independent growth in his stats to complement the refinement of his fighting style. His perception and Strength both increased by two points as he worked his muscles and learned to pay better attention to his opponents tells. His Dexterity increased by double that, which he assumed was due to the sheer amount of dodging he was forced into.

#

Over the following nights he couldn’t help but be proud of himself. His situation was steadily improving and he was finally beginning to have real hope for his chances of surviving this forest. His weeks of hunting and growing had allowed him to set up a comfortable little encampment, complete with a small, rough treehouse to sleep safely in at night. He had set up traps and found the best fruit trees. Identified local streams with clean, clear water. He had even built a small cook site some ways from his encampment.

The deer, which were apparently much smarter than he gave them credit for, put an end to that.

It had started while he was fighting a Raptor. He had been waiting for it to break off from its companion for most of an hour and had jumped upon the opportunity mere minutes after the monsters had separated. From there the fight had been fairly normal. He had imposed a handicap on himself – only allowing himself to use his Blood Blade five times in the fight – and had a plan to slowly whittle the monster down.

He had started by dancing around it while allowing the Blood Roil Aura to do its job for a short amount of time. In addition, he had baited the thing into several bad charges that had resulted in the creature tripping or smashing in to various trees, shrubs, and holes in the vicinity. These had done nothing to hurt the monstrous bird, but had slowly driven it into a rage. When the thing had wound up for a full-strength charge with fury in its eyes, Elijah had used Blood Roil Burst to knock it off balance.

Taking advantage of the opening, he had used his first cast of Blood Blade to drive his sword into the creature’s side and open a deep gash from wing to hip. It was a powerful strike on its own, and his armor quickly compounded the damage as it went to work on weakening the thing even further. It had been a better strike than Elijah had hoped for and he was growing excited anticipating the coming victory.

Then large, sharp horns forced their way through the Ghoul Raptor from the other side. A Ghoul Deer, drops of foaming spittle dripping from a mouth crammed full of misaligned fangs, revealed itself as it lifted the impaled bird above its head. The thing snarled at him in a way that seemed almost possessive.

Like it was saying “My prey. My territory. Mine.”

Then, with a disdainful flick of its horned head, it dropped the dead raptor to the ground beside itself and let out a bellowing sound. It was as though someone had taken a recording of a sheep’s bleat, dropped the pitch as far as they could, and played it on high volume in an echo chamber. The force of the cry sent spittle and drool flying at Elijah’s face, covering him with a disgusting slime that smelled of rotten flesh and decaying compost.

The cry had also alerted the rest of its herd and he had quickly seen their shapes dashing around the surrounding forest. The toxic glow of their green eyes and the panting of deep breaths forced through their agape mouths created an atmosphere of approaching doom that quickly swallowed any will he had to fight back. His urge to run only grew as the beast in front of him lowered its head and pawed the ground, preparing to charge. He had no choice; he dove behind a tree and desperately began putting distance between himself and the ravenous creatures.

#

The chaotic pursuit that had followed had shaven years off his life with pure stress. His spells could do nothing to help him escape, focused as they were on defense and area control. He had been relying on pure physical abilities, the healing effect from armor (both the spell and the actual gear), and successfully utilizing the terrain to prevent any of the herd from having an easy charge at him.

The flight had nearly forced him deeper into the forest. The Deer had almost seemed to be herding him in that direction. Unsure if that was because they had a trap set up for him, if they knew that way was certain death for him, or if that had simply been the easiest direction to herd him, he had been forced to make a decision. In the end Elijah had decided that there was far more potential danger to doing what they wanted then attempting to break out. He had decided to remain in the Fall zone of the forest and run while keeping the cold spot drawing him toward the center of the forest at his side.

They had broken off their pursuit at what he assumed to be the edge of their territory, after maybe thirty minutes of pursuit. It had seemed they were less interested in killing him and more annoyed that he had been killing the prey in their area. His guess was that they had simply been defending what was theirs from what they saw as an outside predator muscling in on their territory.

The scuffle had left him bruised, battered, cut, and gored through one arm. His leather armor was practically rags and he had been forced to leave most of his stuff behind at his campsite. Thankfully he had thought of a solution for that. During his run he had taken slices out of the trees with his Blood Blade – a spell that had unfortunate amounts of fuel from his own body to sustain it throughout the escape. Between the draw of the center of the forest and the slash marks, he should be able to find his way back to a familiar area during the day.

For now, he was exhausted, injured, and in a bad mood. He was going to climb a tree, sleep as best he could, and rethink his strategy while he went to collect his things in the morning. It would be a cold, uncomfortable night and he was sure he was going to wake up stiff and grouchy. One more reason to keep improving. He didn’t want to get muscled out of an area as soon as he had made it reasonably comfortable.

#

When he woke in the morning, he could only pinch his nose at the message that awaited him. Apparently, his work tracking and killing the Raptor had been for basically nothing. He had only received about a third of the experience from the fight. When he had questioned the voice about it, he had received a rather lengthy explanation about the metaphysics behind the splitting of the soul. He had eventually been able to get an idea of what the voice was trying to say and it boiled down to this: when multiple people were responsible for killing a creature, they had to split the rewards. Including the soul bits that could be cannibalized to strengthen your own soul. Unfortunately, splitting those soul bits resulted in waste and reduced the amount received even more.

Generally, the harder you worked the larger the percentage of Experience you would receive. The why of this was rather complicated, but as far as he could tell one’s soul was rather similar to a muscle. Experiencing mental exhaustion or strong emotions would stress it and create tiny amounts of damage all over, similar to when you worked out. The more damage your soul accumulated the more “hungry” it was for resources to increase the speed at which it could repair itself. The more it wanted the resources, the more it would hog what was left behind after killing an opponent.

It was infuriating that the deer simply flying in at the last minute with one powerful spell had apparently stressed the things soul enough to compare with his almost hour-long hunt, but more moderated use of magic. Because of that, the monster had forced a near even split of the experience. Not to mention the waste that was lost simply because they both had a hand in killing the thing! According to the voice it wasn’t normally that extreme, but because they were enemies their souls had fought each other almost as much as they had fought to claim the leftover pieces of the Raptors soul. Hyperinflating the loss from the split about as far as it would go. Overall, the monster had managed to make itself quite the pest.

Then he noticed something that changed his mind about his annoyance with the Ghoul Deer. At the base of the tree he had slept, impossible to see in the darkness of night, was the remains of a cook fire. A ring of stones around a pile of charcoal and ash. Somebody else had been here, and at least semi recently. There were people somewhere around here.

He still needed to collect his things of course. Showing up and immediately needing to beg supplies off of these fellow victims of the forest’s horrors would hardly put them in the best mood. The knowledge was still enough to give him a spring in his step and make the walk back into the Ghoul Deer territory far more tolerable.

That wasn’t to say he was thrilled when he reached his camp and found a number of perfectly normal deer though. They were about the same size as the Ghoul Deer and had given him quite a scare when he had first returned. Thankfully closer examination had revealed that, like he initially suspected, they were almost no different than the mule deer he had seen growing up. Mid-sized herbivores that were quick to scatter when they noticed his own presence.

The Ghoul Deer had obviously known where he holed up to sleep. They had scraped the base of his tree bare of bark, carved deep gouges that scarred the surround earth, and uprooted small plants in the vicinity. He even saw evidence of the creatures gnawing on the roots below the tree. Anything they could reach with their horns, fangs, or claws was torn apart.

Thankfully, that didn’t amount to much. A rope ladder and spare set of clothes that had been hanging to dry. His pile of firewood. The bottom of the platform he had built in the tree was scratched up, but not really damaged. Not that it would have mattered if it was. He had gotten the message and was leaving. Perhaps the only real loss was a nice pot he had purchased to make stew with, which had been trampled into a useless lump of scrap metal.

Packing up the closest thing to a home that Elijah had created since dying in his old life, he couldn’t help a small pang of regret. Triss probably would have loved it, all the high places and the nest of blankets. Hopefully Jason was taking good care of her. Jason would have hated it out here. In the summer he hated bugs and loathed not having AC. During the winter he had a personal grudge against snow and ice. Apparently growing up he had been talked into plowing drive ways for a first job by his dad, who had really been pushing it to help out the number of elderly couples living in their neighborhood. That hadn’t lasted so long since about a week in he slipped on some ice and broke an arm….

Reminiscing was painful. He couldn’t go back to that life and who knew when this “conversion” to his world would occur. It was best to acknowledge his old life was over. It was just so hard to remember that. Finished with his packing, he shook himself off and prepared to head back out into the forest.

#

Tracking the people who had come through the forest before him proved far more difficult than he hoped. It was bad enough he had no real training in tracking, but the forest itself seemed dedicated to confounding him. These people had headed slightly deeper into the woods, into late fall. That wouldn’t have been a problem, he’d made occasional trips into the late fall zone and it wasn’t particularly dangerous, but when you made it to that section the forest floor was covered in a layer of fallen leaves. Elijah had never realized just how quickly that layer would reform and cover any signs of passage.

He could still make out the occasional sign. A campfire here. A cleared path throught he underbrush there. It wasn’t going to be enough though. It simply took him too long to track these signs down and he fell further behind every hour. The only thing he could determine for sure was that this group, if it was just one group that had left all these signs, had not just headed straight toward the center of the forest. They weren’t reckless or capable enough for that it seemed.

Instead, they were slowly zigzagging their way closer. He assumed it was some sort of attempt to adjust to the forest and better understand the threat they were under. Then again, maybe they knew something he didn’t. He doubted there were traps in this forest, but he couldn’t just ignore that possibility. The other option is that there was some kind of treasure that could be found and they had created a route to allow them to collect as many of these treasures as possible.

#

The only plus side to taking so long to find these unknown people was that it gave him time to think. Why would they help him? He was an unknown individual with no connections and no money. He was all risk with zero potential benefits. So, what could he do to make himself worthwhile?

His first thought was that he needed to show he wouldn’t slow them down. That he could keep up with them in combat. That wouldn’t give them a reason to keep him around, but it would decrease the risk in taking him in. With that in mind, he decided to continue his current training as he tried to find a way to prove his value to this unknown group.

#

When the time eventually came for him to face a Ghoul Badger, Elijah was terrified. The creatures were his superior in physical and magical strength, easily capable of killing him if he let his guard down. His only hope was to properly prepare for the confrontation and hope he could defeat his chosen prey. During the day he had found signs of its presence, marks that had been…unpleasant but obvious.

Like many Mustelids back on Earth, the Ghoul Badger had a very distinct smell. It was what Elijah had long used to avoid them at night. The smell was pungent, heavy with the scent of decay and rot. The smell was nearly enough to cause him to puke, and reminded him unpleasantly of the time a mouse had died in his bedroom wall. Magnified a few hundred times. The entire territory would smell faintly of this awful stench, but that wasn’t the only give away.

The badgers would dig pits and fill them with offal and waste like some kind of totem. It was a particularly unpleasant habit because the fallen leaves would often fill these pits, making them nearly unnoticeable. Despite his lacking abilities, Elijah was quick to learn the signs of that particular issue after the first time he stepped into a Ghoul Badgers pit. It was an intensely unpleasant experience, but it was also a danger when fighting in their territory. One could far too easily twist an ankle when taking an unexpected plunge into the holes.

Just to be sure, he had hidden in one of the trees in the territory and kept an eye out for the creature. He wanted to know what, exactly, he was dealing with. The monster that had appeared was on the smaller side for its kind. Maybe closer two and a half feet tall than three and lean. Streaks of grey filled what remained of its tattered and mangey fur, leaving the thing looking old and rumpled. Its left eye was missing, leaving nothing but a grey-pink bit filled with black, gelatinous blood and yellow fluids.

Besides the mouth, which was full of three rows of jagged teeth not quite as oversized as a number of the other ghoul species (allowing them to close their mouths in a wide, shark toothed grin), the things had a number of other natural defenses. As if to make up for the smaller fangs, the Ghoul Badgers had massively oversized claws on their front paws. Each one was so large it was almost as if the toe grew from the claw rather than the other way around, resulting in an almost gauntlet like structure surrounding the creatures’ feet.

Plates of spiked bones covered the monsters head, spine, and upper limbs in living armor. The bone was unnaturally tough, easily capable of surviving slashes from the Raptors and goring from the Boars. It would likely even stand up to multiple strikes from his Blood Blade. A small cloud of purple and black followed the creature, releasing from under these armored plates, and the thing could use it to perform various types of magic.

Beams of deadly energy similar to the Rats and Foxes, an enhancement to their claws that left them glowing a deep purple and let them cut through things as easily as his own Blood Blade, and a spell that would thicken the cloud so that the beast itself was practically impossible to see. The last one might have been the most dangerous. It resulted in everything caught within the cloud rapidly withering and dying, leaving behind husks drained of life. The only plus side was that the spell seemed to consume almost all of the creatures’ mana, leaving it nothing but its physical advantages for long minutes after the spell wore off.

The fight had been tough, a slug match as the thing attacked with fury and bloodlust. Entirely relying on its armor to keep it alive while conducting a vicious onslaught with its claws. Without his armor and a willingness to continuously retreat, Elijah would have been quickly disemboweled by the enraged monstrosity. In the end though, Elijah was no mindless beast. With careful strikes he had cut into vulnerable areas on the monster, swiftly reducing its mobility as he slashed apart tendons and muscles.

When the cloud had gone up, he had dashed away. Between the debilitating strikes with his sword, the accumulating effects of his Blood Roil aura (rapidly stacked with liberal usage of Blood Roil Burst), and the monsters own fighting style that quickly left it exhausted the beast had been unable to move after utilizing its trump card. A trump card that failed to drive Elijah away like it would many other creatures out of instinctual fear. The fight had been with a weak and vulnerable Ghoul Badger, but it had pushed Elijah and granted him the next step in his growth. It had helped him put one step in their realm of strength and begin the next stage of his hunt.

#

A week or so later Elijah had been riding the high of being able to compete with the Ghoul Deer and Ghoul Badgers on his own. He had personally been of the opinion that he had finally reached a point where he would not be a liability for this other group in the forest. His personal strength had grown to the point where in the vast majority of cases he would be able to take care of himself and therefore he only needed to prove some modicum of worth to potentially get their help with leaving this forest. Maybe he could cook for them. Jason had always said he should have gone to culinary school.

At least, that had been his opinion until he ran into the latest sign of this other intelligent being’s passage through the forest. In one of the rare clearings in the forest, a horrific battle field had ripped the area to pieces. Like someone with a personal vendetta had gone in with the intention to destroy every square inch of the place. The ground had suffered deep gouges, been cratered in various areas, and scorched down to the earth. What plants had been in the area looked like they had been ripped up, fed through a woodchipper, and then fired into the air like confetti. Most horrifying of all was a mound of cracked, broken, and gnawed bones. A skull the size of his torso. Claws that could have pierced through his chest with room to spare. Canines the size of his forearm.

The thing was so large it was almost impossible for Elijah to reconcile with a living creature. Well, if you can call the ghouls alive. Still though, this is insane. And someone managed to kill this thing. How? I bet when it was alive this monster could have cracked open armor like I break open a peanut shell.

So much for believing he could keep up with this party. No way he could take one of these things down.

For now, he intended to follow the rather obvious trail of the massive Ghoul Bear back to its layer. That should be as safe as any other option with most of the inhabitants of the forest still scared to enter the area. At least theoretically. He also hoped that might be where this group had headed. After all, they must have hunted this thing for a reason. Unless it was so little threat that it represented easy experience. Now that was a terrifying thought.

#

Following that trail was quickly proving to be one of the biggest mistakes Elijah had ever made. For starters, it took him through not one, not two, but three Ghoul Badger territories. He had only had to fight two, finding the third’s bones scattered across the forest floor, but two was exhausting enough. Then there was the fact he had to spend several hours dealing with the stench and territorial hazards of the pungent monsters.

Just that would have been enough to make the night stressful and unpleasant, but then he had been forced to cut through the territory of a rather large pack of the Ghoul Deer. While not as individually threatening as a Ghoul Badger, they rarely appeared in groups smaller than four. This group was obviously used to the far more dangerous conditions of living in a gigantic monstrous bear’s territory and liked to group up even more. He had been forced to flee, and thankfully the pack had quickly abandoned their chase of him as he followed the trail of smashed and torn plants further into the apex predator’s territory.

All of this had culminated with him discovering that the Ghoul Bear’s territory was not, apparently, unoccupied. Apparently, the thing had had a mate or child or something! It had been easy enough to realize something was still in the area, with the atmosphere around the cave the tracks had led back to. Deep breaths like powerful bellows had left echoing snorts of wind blasting a purple and silver cloud of magic out of the entrance while an almost physical aura of threat and danger pushed down on the surrounding. Trees for a hundred feet from the entrance were snapped in half, cut into toothpicks, or bodily ripped from the ground. A number of them extremely recently, as if in some sort of fit of rage.

Perhaps most terrifying, he had seen the shadow of the creature inside the cave moving around. It was every bit as big as the skeleton in the clearing implied. Large arms and massive paws equipped with claws at least as large as his sword. A quadrupedal form that was six feet tall at the shoulder if it was an inch. A powerful mouth, large even for the beast’s massive frame. A pair of large spikes protruding from its shoulders, perfect for a goring charge. Small horns forming a crown of twisted bone upon its brow. Cloaked in that silver and purple cloud of deadly power. This thing was certainly a king of The Forest of the Final Sleep.

His first instinct had been to run. It was the smart thing to do. It was the safe thing to do. It was the move that would have kept him alive. There was nothing he could do to kill this thing. Yet a part of him refused to take a step back. He was a person who liked to be prepared. To know what his opponent was capable of. To have a plan and be entirely assured of his victory. He couldn’t do that this time.

If he stepped back now it felt like an acknowledgement that he would always back down when the situation called for a gamble.

He wasn’t entirely foolish. He would spend some more time observing. Try to come up with a plan. He couldn’t just step back from this challenge though. He would beat this thing and prove to himself he was ready to continue forward.

#

Over the next hour he watched. He planned. He noted weaknesses he could exploit and particularly dangerous things to look out for. Most of it was guesswork considering nothing was foolish enough to approach the den and get in a fight with the beast, but he got a better idea of what it looked like and how it moved.

The thing, like the Rats, Raptors, and Badgers before it, was extremely front heavy. Its frame was more like a gorilla then a bear and the rear legs were extremely under muscled. Like a bear from Earth, it was capable of balancing on those back paws for a more Bipedal stance while attacking. He doubted it would be capable of moving while doing that and was likely rather unstable in general.

The unbalanced frame of its body made it slow and rather uncoordinated as well. It likely relied on hitting with so much power that it only had to actually hit once, and would be incapable of any kind of furious assault like the Badgers preferred. When it charged him, he would need to be careful. If he timed it right though, he could likely dive out of the way. He would want to attack from the rear anyway, as large bone plates protected much of its front from assault.

It was dangerous, but the thing had clear weaknesses. It would have a hard time hitting him, but a single blow would likely mean his end. He would need to stay outside of range and wear it down slowly. And he couldn’t just rely on a fair one on one battle. He would need to prepare the field first. Make plans to slow it down and provide cover for himself. Good thing I’ve stored most of my Evolution Points.

He would need to prepare himself as well of course. Spend what stat points he hadn’t already. Make a purchase or two.

He could be ready in two hours.

#

He was as good as his word. Two hours later he had finished his preparations and began working his way toward the cave. Before he even began his approach, he had activated his armor, blade, and aura spells. He had once again upgraded his armor, which now featured a breastplate of solid metal and a new enchantment. A simple reinforcement spell to increase the defensive properties of the metal, but still a marked improvement.

Like he had expected, it didn’t take long for the caves now sole resident to notice his approach. With a roar that seemed to rattle his very bones, the beast lumbered its way outside and glared at him with eyes that were a near pure black. The only exception was a small ember of purple and silver flame that served as a pupil.

The thing took barely one look at him and charged, intent on destroying him in a single swoop. It swiftly entered the range of his aura, which meant the clock had officially begun. It would take quite a while to have an effect though since he had upped the range by a large amount. He didn’t want to get anywhere close to the enraged Ghoul Bear and would take the slower stacking of the buff if it meant better safety for himself.

Soon he was forced to dive to the side, avoiding the things charge as it careened into the forest beyond him. Instead of running from it, he pursued and ensured the beast didn’t have a chance to leave the range of his aura. It also gave him a chance to move the fight into the forest, where he could use the trees for added cover.

Long minutes were spent diving behind trees and doing his best to circle around behind the beast. Always attempting, and always failing, to create a chance to strike the things unprotected rear. The thing bellowed and roared its rage, swinging wildly in attempts to batter him down, only for him to fall back, roll to the side, or run away. Finally, as the thing began to lope forward in the start of a charge, it happened. The thing was pulled up short, distracted away from Elijah for just a moment as it turned to look behind itself.

In that single instant, Elijah took his chance.

Charging forward, Elijah let out a desperate cry as he screamed the name of his new spell, “Vampiric Strike!”

His blood coated sword flared with a ruby light at the blood began to spin wildly up and down the blade. He struck forward in a fencer’s lunge, digging deep into the beast’s left foreleg.