The grómigés had retreated from the field. Faye knew they were still there at the edges of sight, hiding under bushes and in tall grass. Their growling hisses wove together to create a sibilant tapestry of chilling noise, made infinitely worse by the horrible screeches of the bat-hyenas flying above them.

“Why aren’t they coming down?!” she called out.

“Not sure!” Arran replied. “Gavan! Bring one down for a closer look, would you?”

Gavan nodded. He looked up and targeted one. A second later, a thin shard of ice lanced up from between his hands. It sliced through one of the bat-hyena’s membranous wings. It let out a blood curdling howl, dipping down as it struggled to stay aloft.

“They’re tough!” Ailith called out. She waited for a few more desperate flaps of its wings, it was losing height with every half-effective flap, and she let out a wall of sound; her taunt.

The only bat-hyena to get caught in the taunt was the one Gavan had hit; the others were circling above in safety. The one they had targeted immediately stopped fighting its hurt wing, folded both wings closed and dropped like a stone.

A few feet from the ground, it snapped its wings open with a howl and it barrelled straight for Ailith.

Arran intercepted it with a thrust of his blade, only Faye realised with a lurch that he was nowhere near close enough!

“He’s going to miss!” she called out, and the crafters looked up at her cry.

But just as the bat-hyena got to the edge of where Arran’s blade was aiming, it exploded with light and a blade of pure white surged forward in an instant. It speared the bat-hyena and ripped it apart.

“Oh…” Faye said.

“Heh, those adventurers know what they’re doing, lass. Don’t worry.”

Faye turned and nodded to the crafters. That had to be true. They had brought Faye with them, and the monsters were only around her level. She shook her head.

“It’s still hard to think in terms of the levels,” she said. Mich and the other crafters gave each other a look. She ignored them for now. Focusing up at the swirling bat-hyenas, she wondered if she could reach them with her spell.

The main problem was that at the range they were flying at, the darts were so unreliable that they would miss their mark more often than not.

If I could change the way they flew… no, that’s probably not possible — yet at least. No, she thought, what I really need is so many spread out that they can’t help but hit something.

A scattergun approach was likely to be incredibly costly in terms of mana, but if it would hit the flying monsters, then why not?

She looked over to where Gavan was standing, he was frowning up at the monsters, too.

“Gavan, I wanted to check something with you.”

He looked down and nodded at her, walking quickly to her side. He was still tapping a finger against the side of his face as he came over.

“Hmm?” he inquired, in that way of his.

“So, Fire Dart is supremely inaccurate at range.”

The mage nodded.

“I was wondering if there was a maximum range for the spell’s effectiveness. Does it run out of energy over time?”

He cocked his head to the side, then slowly stopped tapping.

“I forget. There is much we have not taught you. For most projectile spells there is a cut off for range, but if you hit an enemy at two paces or at one hundred, it does not matter in terms of damage dealt.”

“How does that work? Energy is there until it isn’t?”

Gavan nodded.

She frowned. She knew enough to think that was incorrect, but not enough to directly challenge it. Now was not the time to prove or disprove practical magic theory, though.

“Okay, so accepting that for a given. I want to be able to hit the flying things—”

“—Greater bats.”

She blinked. “They’re just called Greater Bats?!”

Looking up at the monsters again, she was certain they would have had an odd name, like the meerkat-like scavengers, the grómigés.

“Okay, fine, accepting the fact they’re just called greater bats, for heaven’s sake… So, I was thinking that if I was able to throw enough darts up at them, in a wide enough pattern, that I would hit something, right?”

Gavan nodded. “A waste of mana, in some sense. For a traditional mage, that kind of thinking is suicide.” Then he shrugged. “But for our purposes, we need to encourage the greater bats to fly down. Attacking them is almost guaranteed to do so.”

Faye nodded. “Okay, so what fast-moving spells do you have access to?”

“Mana bolt.”

“That’s it?” she asked, curious.

“Most of my more powerful spells are more suited to ground-based enemies. Something I shall remedy.”

“Okay. And, your Fire Dart, how did you get it so accurate?”

Gavan smiled. “Practise.” He dropped the grin, though. “In truth, there are a small number of changes that a mage can use to affect spells during casting. It is an experimental thing. Once you practise enough, you can consistently produce a desired, altered effect.”

Faye nodded. “That’s what I thought. Okay. That’s no problem. I’ll try that.”

Gavan looked bemused, but Faye pushed him out of her mind.

Alright, it takes skill and practise. That’s fine. Experiment.

Magic. Is. Amazing.

Grinning like a schoolgirl, Faye moved away from the others a few steps. She did not want to accidentally blast someone in the face.

Concentrating, she reached inside for the switch on her Sense ability.

Flipping it activated it.

That strange sensation of seeing everything around her rose dramatically. Sensing no grómigés close enough to bother the crafters, she deactivated the skill. Arran had told her that those kinds of perception skills improved over time, but that the short duration was normal for her level.

She had some ideas to game the way the skill worked, but again, now was not the time to test wild theories.

Faye set her stance, feet shoulder width apart, arms and hands loose, by her sides. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath for a slow count to five.

Then, after a few moments, let it out slowly to another count of five.

The mana forms into a dart above my hand as I cast the spell. I can hold it still, activated but not, for a small period of time. Maybe I can cast another one before the first activates?

Faye opened her eyes and tilted her head back, pointing one hand toward the sky. She sighted roughly in the direction of the greater bats.

[Fire Dart].

Exerting her will upon the small dart of mana that emerged when the spell activated, she held it in place, then moved her hand minutely and immediately cast again.

[Fire Dart].

The exact moment that she cast the second dart, the first igniting into existence too. Both darts then scorched upward toward the greater bats.

The small blazes of flames shot past the bats without hitting any of them.

“Damn.”

“Nice work, Faye!” Arran called out.

She looked over with a scowl. Was he mocking her? She had missed!

Gavan was looking at her with wide eyes. She just frowned and shook her head. Sometimes the playful banter was fun, other times it just reminded her how much she needed to learn to get on the same level as the other adventurers… literally!

Closing her eyes and thinking about her cast, she realised that something about the panicked way she had cast the second dart had set off the first one. She would need to be able to cast and hold the darts indefinitely before she would be able to create a scattergun fire dart.

But then, she thought, I just cast two fire darts. It did not save mana, and I missed. So that was two spells worth of mana wasted. Is there a more efficient way to split them?

This time, as Faye held her hand above her, aiming toward the bats, she concentrated on the small, invisible dart of mana that appeared in her mind’s eye when she cast the spell.

[Fire Dart].

As it formed from her internal reserves, Faye focused on it.

Split.

Unsurprisingly, it did not seem to have an effect.

With a small sigh, she moved her hand a little before the dart ignited and scorched away upward with a slight curve to its flight.

By some quirk of fate, the curve of the dart’s path put it on a perfect interception with one of the greater bats, but it had seen the dart coming and it banked harder to get out of the spell’s way.

She had missed a third spell.

To really rub it in, Gavan then looked up and cast what Faye assumed were Mana Bolts. At first, it looked like a single projectile, which he launched up into the centre mass of the bats. But as they reached the height of the monsters, they exploded into multiple Mana Bolts. Two of the greater bats were blasted by multiple projectiles, the others were either inadvertently shielded or were lucky enough to move out of the bolts’ paths.

The two greater bats Gavan had managed to hit screeched and dove for the group.

Faye narrowed her eyes. They were diving straight for Gavan.

[Fire Dart].

[Fire Dart].

She managed to cast two before the first spell ignited, again. This time the bats flying directly toward the spells, both of which had ignited and streaked upward.

One of the bats tilted a wing and dodged the first dart, which sent it into the path of the second. The dart exploded with force against its face and its flight immediately turned into an uncontrolled tumble.

Congratulations! Your group has defeated a level nine [Greater Bat].

Experience gained.

There was no time to celebrate, because the other bat had swerved wildly to dodge the spell and it had changed target. Its leathery wings snapped open and its screech practically physically assaulted them as the bat barrelled toward the crafters at high speed.

Before it could crash into the trio, who were elbow deep in the guts of the beast corpse and not paying attention, Gavan flung out a hand.

A shard of ice lanced forward to intercept the bat, from its blind spot.

The shard slammed into the bat, the force of impact knocking it so far off course the crafters did not even look up to see what had happened.

“Always be prepared to follow up your initial spell, Faye.”

She nodded, swallowing. She could have probably got another dart, or two, off if she had tried. But a small part of her whispered that she might have hit the crafters with the spell.

Something with her [Swordfighter’s Sense] ability pinged the back of her thoughts, so she activated it for a second.

With her expanded senses, she saw the skulking grómigé that was sneaking up on her.

With a burst of speed, the monster exploded from out of the grasses and streaked toward her. Its three sets of limbs propelling it forward with a speed that probably surprised many an adventurer.

Faye threw out her left hand and reached across to her left hip with her right hand at the same time.

[Fire Dart].

She drew her borrowed blade at almost the same time as the dart exploded into life. As she slashed outward on the draw, the steel of her sword passed through the flickering remnants of the fire dart’s trail, knocking some of the sparks and smoke aside.

The grómigé were scavengers, small and fast, if they were anything like scavengers on Earth, Faye knew that they were less capable of combat than the average animals of similar size, preferring to flee. They had already scared off the majority of the monsters, but it seems that every rule has an exception, because this grómigé tried to launch itself straight for Faye.

That led it straight into the path of both the fire dart and her sword. Her first slash missed because as it had launched itself forward, its front limbs reared upward, but the flames of the dart impacted its belly and drew a pained cry from it.

And Faye knew much more about her sword than any spell. Her hand was already turning for the repeat downstroke. From top right to bottom left, Faye pulled the sword backward to cut as much as possible. The sharp steel split the grómigé’s flesh easily.

It landed with a thud at her feet, dropping without much ceremony there like a puppet with its strings cut.

Congratulations! You have defeated a level five [Grómigé].

Experience awarded.

Her sword was covered in its blood. She shook her head. If only everything dissolved like those sprites had. She wiped the blade on its fur to get the majority of the red mess off.

“That was good,” Arran said as he walked a little closer, though he kept his eyes on the remaining greater bats. “Well done on the quick thinking. Have you been concentrating on that feeling I told you to look out for?”

Faye grimaced. “Ah, shit, no. Sorry. Most of the time they’re too far away for me to feel anything. When they are close enough, I’m too busy not getting mauled to bother trying.”

Arran frowned. “I understand, but it is something that should be second nature to you. Most of us learn it from childhood. You should be able to sense their strength. It tells you whether you’re getting into a fight you can win. It saves lives.”

Faye shrugged. “I assume that every fight is my last, Arran. That’s how it works where I’m from. A stray punch can kill someone, just because. Fighting is never safe.”

He nodded. “True enough, but, Faye, I promise that there are going to be times that you feel invincible. It’s inevitable. You will get much stronger and faster than you are now. It will be unusual for you not to expect to win fights that on the surface seem simple.”

“That’s what gets adventurers killed,” Ailith added. She had wandered a little closer, to listen. “It’s good that you expect each fight to be your last right now… but can you keep thinking that when your skills let you sense a monster sneaking up on you and you can cast a spell at it without turning your head?”

Gavan nodded, as did Arran.

Faye shrugged. “Alright, I’ll keep trying.”

“That’s all we are asking,” Arran said, with a smile. “Keep up the good work.”

Faye nodded and moved back to the crafters. She was still their last line of defence.

Mich looked up at her as she approached. He pulled his hands out of the incision he was making. He wasn’t holding a knife, and the beast’s blood covered his arms up to his elbows.

She tried not to turn up her nose, but it was literally disgusting.

“That was amazing, miss,” Mich said. He sniffed and wiped his chin on his shoulder. “Ah, dammit, got an itch. How’d you learn to do that?”

Faye blinked, “Uh, Fire Dart? It’s a pretty simple spell… ahh—”

“Oh, sorry, nah,” Mich said, “I meant casting it with your sword. That was mighty impressive. Don’t think I’ve seen that before.”

Faye opened her mouth to negate what Mich had said, but she thought about it some more.

Was that possible? Casting fire darts from the end of her sword would increase the length of her thrust, effectively. Almost like the skill, or spell, Arran had used on the bat earlier.

Mich did not say anything else, and when Faye thought to thank him for the idea, he had already turned back to his work. She left the crafters to it and idly took a small patrol around their section.

Casting spells… with my sword?

Faye was still thinking about it when she heard something.

“Faye!”

The shout came from behind her, so she turned. The dark shape of a greater bat was almost upon her.

[Fire dart]!

The time between the dart’s ignition and it exploding in the bat’s face was short enough that the bat barrelled into her. She flew backward but did not feel the impact. Adrenaline had her in its mind-altering grip – as did the bat.

Faye and the bat rolled over and over until they slammed into the corpse of the beast. The bat screeched and snapped its great hyena-like jaws at her. She had somehow found herself on top of it, and for a moment she had the advantage. She bore down on it with her bodyweight, scrabbled at the small of her back with her left hand, and a moment later slammed her dagger into the greater bat’s eye socket.

Congratulations! You have defeated a level seven [Greater Bat].

Experience awarded.

She barely looked at the notification. Her pulse was racing like mad, and something was wrong with her legs. They were too wobbly. She couldn’t get to her feet.

A moment later, another notification pinged.

Congratulations! You have gained enough experience points to level up. You are now level 6.

Congratulations! Your spellcasting has improved. [Fire Dart] is now level 2.

Oh, that’s nice, she thought before slipping into unconsciousness.