Jack barely had any time to react. The ogre was the definition of a lumbering brute but he had one hell of a first step and long reach to boot. What’s more, the club glowed with some orange light that coalesced in the spikes making them red-hot. Instead of trying to dodge the attack with his atrocious agility, he brought up his left arm to guard his head bracing it with his right. The blow landed with a loud bang as the wooden club impacted Jack’s metallic arm. In his mind, an update flashed across his mind.

[Warning: You have taken critical damage. Ethos is at 50% capacity]

Fuck me, Jack inwardly groaned, simultaneously pushing the spiked club away. The spikes burned through the sleeves of his coat and scraped against the metallic surface of his arm creating a grating noise as Jack shoved the club away. The ogre’s face screwed up in anger and confusion while the rat-faced man reached for his sigil gun.

He grimaced under his mask. His Ethos had absorbed the damage he would have taken from the blow but if he took another one of those attacks he’d be in big trouble. By the looks of it, the ogre had some sort of elemental attack skill which made his spiked club all the more dangerous. Not to mention, he had four other opponents. Though Alindal was with him, his friend was an easy target due to his low defenses and Jack had no idea what the mage with the sigil gun was capable of. He needed to defend the elven mage and deal with the other threats at the same time. In short, he needed to even out the numbers a bit. He activated the Shadowtitan’s Fist.

Behind him, he heard the individuals approaching from the rear exclaim as his shadow elongated and widened to twice its normal size. A groan echoed from the enlarged shadow. It detached from Jack gaining definition and form. Without a second glance, he turned on his heel to face the three opponents behind him.

“The mage,” he said, knowing Alindal would understand what he meant. The ogre didn’t take kindly to Jack turning his back to him. He roared and swung his club again with sparks flying from the spikes. The Shadowtitan reached out a hand as though it might try to stop the strike but instead ghoulish hands erupted from the ogre’s shadow restraining his arms and legs. Alindal had begun moving his hands in intricate patterns leaving behind trails of starlight in their wake as he prepared to cast a spell. Jack didn’t see what happened next since he had more pressing concerns.

The three brigands wore rags similar to the ogre though, thankfully, none of them looked nearly as formidable. Two of them were human, a man and a woman, while the third was a scaly reptilian humanoid that less than half Jack’s height— a kobold if he recalled correctly. The two humans rushed him knives in hand while the kobold hung back looking for an opening. Jack drew his metal club with his right hand and swung it at the man’s head while he moved his left hand to intercept the woman’s knife strike.

For his part, the man tried to dodge Jack’s blow; unfortunately for him, he had about as much grace as Jack did. The attack smashed into the man’s head followed quickly by the telltale shimmer of his Ethos collapsing from the damage. The remaining damage spilled over to the man’s skull sending him crumpling to the ground in one blow, bloody but alive. While Jack lacked attack skills, he did boast physical strength similar to that of the ogre thanks to his high base Might attribute and the bonus from the Shadowtitan’s Fist.

On his left side, Jack’s clumsiness sabotaged his efforts much in the same way the man’s lack of grace had thwarted his dodge. He tried to grab the woman’s arm when she moved in for the attack yet he fumbled the attempt which let her slip into his guard. Suddenly, her movements sped up as she delivered two quick cuts to his shoulder and leg then danced backward.

Her abrupt speed boost told him that she likely had some sort of movement-enhancing skill which made her a difficult opponent for Jack. He received another notification of his Ethos being depleted but ignored it as he jumped sideways to avoid a green vial that the kobold threw. The vial shattered upon impact with the ground causing the stone beneath to hiss and filling the air with the sharp smell of acid. Jack cursed his luck. He didn’t want to know what that would do to him if he got hit with it. Not wanting to test it, he reached down hoisting the unconscious man up with his left hand. The burden felt light despite the man’s bulk.

With his new shield, he charged the kobold who panicked and threw another vial. It splashed against the man and the smell of burning flesh and acid filled Jack’s nostrils. The woman screamed for the kobold to hold his fire as he prepared to throw yet another vial. The kobold hesitated. At that moment, the crack of thunder echoed from behind Jack along with a bright flash of light and the smell of ozone. The woman and the kobold recoiled in surprise and fear. While he couldn’t see what had happened, he knew that Alindal had completed his spell.

In the confusion, Jack abruptly heaved the man onto the woman who reflexively tried to catch him. Immediately after tossing his meat shield, Jack aimed a sharp low kick at the kobold’s legs. The lizard creature failed to recover quickly enough to dodge the kick which connected squarely with his hip. He didn’t go down but the blow left the small humanoid staggered for half a second which gave Jack enough time to bring his club down on its scaly face. Unlike the man, the kobold Ethos must have been pitifully weak because the blow caved in its skull with little resistance. He turned away from the woman who was trying to extricate herself from underneath the larger man’s bulk while simultaneously trying to avoid touching the places where the acid had burned his flesh.

Alindal was facing off against the mage who had suffered several burns along his arm by the looks of it. The man shot a series of fiery orbs from the muzzle of his sigil gun which Alindal countered with a blast of ice. The rat-faced man’s expression turned from hostile to worried. He couldn’t have known that Alindal was a powerful caster or that Jack had been funneling the excess eidos stones he gained from his job as a Tracer into the elf’s designation for years. It wasn’t much since Jack never got eidos stones higher than E grade; however, it had been enough for Alindal to unlock multiple magic skills.

Meanwhile, adjacent to the magical duel, the Shadowtitan maintained its hold on the ogre though that wasn’t going to last by the looks of it. The gray-skinned creature’s massive bulk flexed against the Shadowtitan’s restraints which were beginning to fray at their base. Jack threw caution to the wind dashing into the fray. Alindal’s opponent made to turn his sigil gun on Jack but was instantly forced to dive out of the path of a gout of flame from the star elf.

Jack charged the ogre who redoubled his efforts to escape the grasp of the shadowy hands when he saw Jack approaching. The hands struggled to keep hold of the brute; digging ghoulish claws into him at the same time. Unsurprisingly, the ogre’s Ethos seemed tough enough to weather the Shadowtitan’s assault. Jack reached his target just as he managed to free the arm holding his wooden club. A savage swing arced toward Jack who barely stumbled out of the way in time. The clumsy dodge sent him tumbling into the rat-faced man which unintentionally disrupted another volley of shots from the sigil gun sending the fiery spheres high into the air.

Grumbling, Jack pushed off of the man roughly sending him sprawling to the ground. He rushed the ogre again this time coming from the side. The gray-skinned goon had managed to free his dominant leg and stepped forward aiming a fiery club strike at the Shadowtitan. Jack cursed again as the blow connected and he received a notification.

[The Shadowtitan has been destroyed. Call of the Shadowtitan is on cooldown (5:00)]

He wasted no time taking advantage of the opening from the ogre’s attack. Using the momentum from his short charge, Jack stepped forward aiming a brutal swing at the back of his opponent’s knee. The ogre’s Ethos prevented his attack from dealing major damage but the sheer force of the blow made the brute fall on one knee. While he was staggered, Jack rained two more blows down on the creature’s head; however, the ogre ducked his head and the strikes smashed into his shoulders. Finally, the shimmer of the oaf’s Ethos breaking appeared. He raised his metal club to finish the job.

Before he got the chance to swing, a heavy backswing of the ogre’s club caught the shoulder and upper ribs of his right side. The force of the blow made Jack drop his club and prompted a worrying message.

[Warning: Ethos has been depleted. Proceed with caution.]

His opponent rose to his feet and began to turn as Jack reeled from the attack. Not wanting to die, Jack powered through the pain, rushing the brute in a surge of adrenaline. The ogre hadn’t expected Jack to act so quickly. He aimed a clumsy swing at Jack’s head which Jack dodged pushing behind the gray-skinned humanoid. With a massive jump, he latched onto the creature’s neck wrapping his metallic arm around his opponent’s throat and squeezing as hard as possible. The force of his chokehold increased as adrenaline-infused him with strength. At the same time, a sharp burning began to echo through his body. He roared in the ogre’s ear, both from the building pain and to disorient the creature.

The ogre backed up against the wall slamming Jack into the stone in an attempt to dislodge him but he wouldn’t budge. He growled as the dull hints of pain started blossoming in his back and clamped down on the brute’s thick neck with all his might. Soon, the ogre’s struggles became muted as lack of oxygen disrupted his ability to function.

Nearby, he saw Alindal pointed a sparking finger at the woman who’d managed to pull herself together. She had her hands up. In his exertion, he hadn’t seen what happened to the rat-faced man but he assumed his friend had dealt with the problem. Speaking of which, Alindal was looking at him and saying something but he couldn’t hear it over the beating of his own heart.

Suddenly, he noticed something tapping lightly on his metallic arm. No, not lightly but it felt that way because of the numbness. It was the ogre’s hand slapping futilely against his arm. Then, he heard Alindal’s words.

“My friend, stop! He is defeated!” The words reached Jack yet he continued to apply pressure. Jack gaze was hard under the mask as Alindal beseeched him with his eyes. Spare him? Screw that. They had attacked them with the intention to kill after a failed extortion attempt. Now they wanted mercy? What, so they could come back for revenge later and say some like “You should’ve killed us when you had the chance?” Jack had been burned by kindness and mercy before, so he made sure to finish the job. With a grunt, he wrenched the ogre’s neck eliciting a dull crack as his neck snapped and the brute went limp. Alindal’s eyes showed the hurt he felt when Jack took the ogre’s life.

He knew his friend disliked violence and the taking of life even more so; however, Fracture wasn’t a place where one got away with weakness. He groaned in pain then pushed the corpse off of him. Taking stock of the situation, Jack saw that the mage was lying on the ground covered in smoking burns though Jack could still hear the ebb and flow of shallow breath from him. He picked up his club and looked to the alley entrance where he heard the faintest rustling of cloth.

“Whoever you are, I hope you enjoyed the show,” he called out drawing Alindal’s gaze in that direction. The woman also looked back and recoiled when a shadowy figure detached from the darkness. The figure approached with raised hands which prompted Jack to nod at Alindal who refrained from pointing his armed spell at the newcomer. Despite the figure’s unthreatening approached, the hairs on the Jack’s remaining normal arm stood on end. He swept his gaze over the individual’s dark clothing that blended in with the dull metal and stone colors around them. He also saw the figure’s boots blend with the shadows at his feet in the same way that he saw earlier, so when he got a response, he wasn’t surprised.

“Nocturne greets you, outsiders,” said the stranger. Beneath the cowl, all Jack could see was a cheshire-like grin.