I kept my head down to hide my face as I pulled back on Yaavtey, fake stumbling out of the road and into the alley. Just like I predicted he stumbled along with me, mumbling something about it being okay and asking me to let go. I glanced to my side, saw that I needed another half-meter or so of distance before I was deep enough to avoid being seen by most foot traffic, and loosened my grip. I stepped backwards, “lost” my balance again, and tugged harder, sending the two of us into the shade of the buildings. The instant that we were out of direct sight, my right hand went for my knife, then thrust it towards Yaavtey's neck while my left tightened on his clothing.

Three things happened in quick succession, though the rush of battle made me perceive them much more slowly. The first was that I noticed Yaavtey was smiling when I raised my head and met his eyes. The second, which occurred an instant later and was clearly related to the first, was that the knife stopped. My eyes shot to it and I saw that it was two centimeters deep into Yaavtey's neck, but somehow it felt as though I had hit a steel barrier head-on. In the following brief moment of confusion, the third thing happened: A hand closed around my neck and crushed my windpipe with enough force that I felt like I was caught in a hydraulic press.

Before I knew what was happening a massive impact rocked my entire body and the world vanished. I saw nothing, I heard nothing, I felt nothing, I couldn't even think. I had no idea how long the darkness lasted for, but when I awoke again to the feeling of asphyxiation and searing pain I quickly pieced together that I had been slammed head-first into a stone wall. Yaavtey's hand didn't allow any air to enter my lungs, and his face was wild with psychotic glee. I recognized the expression very well since it was one of my favorites to use during combat. I also had the distinct sensation that my feet were no longer planted on the ground, but I couldn't feel them so I wasn't sure.

“You stupid teylm,” he laughed derisively, “I can't believe you were dumb enough to try to kill me in broad daylight, and with a toothpick like this.” My knife was still sticking out of Yaavtey's neck, and as if for effect he flexed his muscles to force it out, catching it with his left hand and twirling it around in an elaborate flourish. Damnit Koyl, I thought, gesturing frantically but as discreetly as possible with my right hand while grappling against Yaavtey's steel grip with my left, shoot a bolt so that I can escape. I couldn't turn my head to look, but no bolt seemed to be coming.

“When I saw you carrying that ridiculous sword I thought the rumors that you could use force magic were true,” Yaavtey mocked. “Turns out my suspicions were right, and you have no such ability. You're no more threatening to me than a child.” The edges of my vision were getting dark, and I knew innately that if I didn't take a breath soon I would be unconscious again. I tried to kick Yaavtey's knee out, but like the rest of him I could barely make his leg budge. “It's a shame you won't be surviving long enough to tell me how you managed to change your face like that,” Yaavtey continued. “Make sure to use your final seconds of life to reflect on what a terrible mistake you made today. Hopefully, your people's gods are more tolerant of failure than mine are.”

“Fuck you,” I managed to choke out somehow, and I mentally started to prepare a volume of heat magic with my right hand. Yaavtey smirked, then jammed my own knife into my stomach before smashing my head against the rock again and releasing me. I willed my body with all my might to move, but the impact had rattled it so badly that it wasn't responding. I felt my right arm jerk up into the air, and as soon as I looked up I saw an ornate hatchet swinging down towards it. I barely registered pain when the blade split my humerus, along with all the tissues that surrounded it, in half. The force that had been holding me up vanished, and I fell forward. Without a right arm to catch me I tumbled and smashed my face into the dirt.

“Just one more,” Yaavtey crooned, “it's impressive that you haven't tried to scream in pain yet. Not that it would do you any good.” My left arm jerked upwards, and I tried to pull it away, but the hatchet came down again and severed it as well. I didn't fall forward again. Instead, I caught myself and looked up at Yaavtey as he tossed my limb aside like trash. He squatted down in front of me, still smiling, and pulled the knife from my belly. “Looks like I aimed a bit too low with this one,” he joked to himself, “I think it's supposed to go... here.” Faster than I could react in my dazed state, the knife split apart my sternum and sunk down to its hilt. I felt a hard mass scrape my spine, twist, and then Yaavtey gave me one final strike to the head that laid me out on the filthy ground. My mouth tried to speak some unknown words as he walked off, but not even a squeak came out.

The whole world slowed down, much like it did during combat, but to an even greater degree. I had no idea how long I was on the ground before I had another thought. That is a lethal wound, my own voice said to me in my head, you're going to lose mental function in under a minute, even with the rapid regeneration. Your heart can't create a proper seal, so its normal function will pump your own blood out into your chest cavity. Three minutes to death, maximum, and that's if your regeneration holds up.

Thump... thump...

My heartbeat was terrifyingly loud, and my vision began to fade. The sounds of the street were far away, and I was finding it hard to remember what was going on. The thumping felt like each beat was minutes apart, but at the same time, they felt as though they were coming terrifyingly quickly. What just happened? I asked myself, Everything was going well, and then it just... wasn't. Did I fail to prepare correctly? Wait a minute, who was the target again?

Thump-thump...

A man with orange hair and orange eyes. That doesn't make any sense, humans can't have orange eyes. Maybe they were contacts, or maybe it was some kind of genetic manipulation. I wanted to laugh, and perhaps I did, but I had no way of knowing because I had lost all sense of my body. I finally failed a mission. I always knew it was an inevitability because over a large enough span of time the probability of any improbable event occurring at least once becomes one hundred percent, but I never thought it would happen so suddenly.

Thump-thump

Beaten by a human. I thought at least it would be one of my own kind. Losing to a superior model of machine, or even a distant relative of myself from an adjacent subtree, I could accept easily. It is the nature of progress to leave the old behind in favor of the new. But a human? I've killed so many humans that I would need to check my records to get an accurate count. Even then, I'm sure I've failed to report many of them simply because it was so routine, or because I couldn't find their corpses. I guess the faster growth rate of more probable events doesn't guarantee that they will happen first.

Thump-thump

Not even a warbreed human! A warbreed human isn't really a human anyway. It's a machine, but one made out of cells grown in a birthing chamber. The thing that I just lost to was so much less than a warbreed. He didn't have reinforced bones, he didn't have adrenaline enhancers, he didn't have an enhanced immune system or hyper-dense musculature. He didn't have a gun, or a passive nanotech armor suit. He was just some barely sapient ape-thing grown out of half-dysfunctional cellular shit, gloating and taunting as he felled a being he didn't even understand out of pure luck.

THUMP-THUMP

How dare a human kill me! It's below me to die like this! I survived on this island with zero mission intelligence, no guidance, not even an overview of the language! I had to figure out how this fucking nonsensical “magic” works by begging illiterate peasants! I killed professional mercenaries, I won a seven-on-one fight with barely more than a few sharpened pieces of metal! LOSING TO A HUMAN IN A FAIR FIGHT? I REFUSE TO ACCEPT IT. I WILL NOT BE KILLED BY SOME STUPID FUCKING ANIMAL BECAUSE MY PATHETIC EXCUSE FOR AN OPERATOR SET ME UP TO FAIL!

THUMPTHUMPTHUMP

My eyes, which I hadn't noticed shutting, shot open and showed me the morning sky. My heart was pounding, and blood was pouring out of my chest wound, but I couldn't bring myself to calm the furious rage that had overcome me. I had no idea how long I had left to be conscious, but I wasn't concerned with it anyhow. With pure instinct I called out to a power I barely understood, then concentrated it on the piece of metal sticking out of me. Strength rushed out of my body as I used force magic to eject the knife from my chest, throwing it into the air in a short arc. It clattered to the ground to my right, and I inhaled my first full breath in minutes through my still-ruined throat.

The burning sensation of rapid healing filled my chest and I knew I was no longer in immediate mortal danger. Several more pained breaths later I looked down at my arms. My right was severed just below the shoulder, and my left was just above the elbow. I knew they would grow back, but I didn't have the time to wait around for it. How long can a human limb remain alive when severed from the body? I asked myself, as if I had the answer ready. With considerable pain and effort, I sat up and looked around.

My right arm was just across the alley, and my left had been thrown further in. I had no idea if what I was thinking was going to work, but I knew I had no choice. I wanted to check my heads-up display, but then thought better of it. It would be better if I don't know how close I am to dying, I told myself, then I had a strange thought: When did I start to think of it as dying? I had no time to ponder, so I leaned over to the knife and gripped it with my teeth, then crawled on my knees across the alley and laid beside my right arm.

It took at least another three minutes, but I managed to move the knife up to my right stump with force magic and position it correctly. I don't know how many tries I have at this, I thought, I need to do this right the first time or I might not be able to attempt it a second time. Putting my stump as close as I could to the cut end of my severed right arm, I gritted my teeth and willed the knife downwards, cutting off the newly formed scar tissue. Immediately I shoved my new wound into my arm's wound, then willed it to reconnect. You motherfucker, I swore in a very human way, you fucking attach back on! Lack of blood flow for a few minutes is nothing compared to some of devastation I've seen these humans heal from. My arm is still alive!

As the rapid healing engaged, a wave of pain emanated out from my head and spine, briefly causing my whole body to seize up as if stuck by a powerful electrical current. I was pretty sure I yelled out, though my ears heard nothing but ringing so I wasn't certain. When the rapid healing stopped, I hesitated for a moment and then looked at my arm, fully expecting to see it still detached because I could feel nothing but the stump. To my surprise, the skin had bonded back, but the way my arm was situated against the stump was wrong, it was rotated almost twenty degrees outward, and the muscle was stretched strangely to compensate for the positioning.

A minute later I regained sensation in my arm, and I picked up the knife with my right hand. Using it would be awkward, but I needed to conserve my strength as much as I could because I wasn't sure how much power I had left. I stumbled over to my left arm and, after holding it in place with force magic, used the knife to slice open my left stump. Like before, as I willed my arm to reconnect as it healed a wave of pain paralyzed me and sent me into spasms on the ground. I bit my tongue, spilling blood into my mouth, but once it passed I saw that my left arm was back where it should have been.

Once my left arm regained sensation and movement, I held out my right arm and struck it as hard as I could with my left, snapping the humerus around the point where it had grown back together. As I had hoped, once the rapid healing finished my right arm was oriented correctly, though the skin still felt twisted. Finally taking a moment to look around, I saw that the alley looked like a bloodbath. The wall I had been thrown into bore cracks from a heavy impact as well as blood spatter, and the ground where I had been laying was covered in crimson. I need to get out of here before someone notices this, I thought blearily.

As I stood up again, my balance failed to engage and I fell leftwards, striking my already-sore head on brick and falling to the ground. As I slid to the ground, I couldn't seem to shrug off the new dizziness the impact had caused and felt myself slowly slipping back into unconsciousness. I should check... oh, I thought as I popped open the heads-up display. I had just enough time to register how almost all the bars were empty before everything went black again.