He didn’t sense or hear anything for a while. A quarter of an hour later, before he fell asleep under the cool cover of the grass, he heard someone, then another. They were far away for a Life Sense not to reach, but close enough to have their conversation heard. He couldn’t see them, which meant they couldn’t see him.

“The tracks end here,” a young man said, likely standing where Kara had jumped. “I’m going to check the trees.”

Nico heard something stomping against the ground, then feet push off of the tree’s trunk. Through the narrow grass Nico saw him catch a branch with two hands. He swung forward, his long brunette hair leaving a smooth tracer of his movements as he landed his feet on top of the branches. Strapped to his shoulder was a short bow. He wore a suit.

“Any new information?” a man said, much older, maybe in his fifties from his rough voice. Nico couldn’t see the rest of them, but from the practiced movement of their Scout he guessed they were around Rank III, fully equipped, and had five members.

“Other than that we should be going in the opposite way it is?” said a woman, maybe in her thirties.

“Get serious,” the man replied.

“The Nightmare,” she said. “Fairies. Cut three in one hit?” She spat. “Lots of blood. It took a pretty large hit here, maybe it out of potions and bleeding somewhere, but I would say that her companion is probably a healer.”

“Why a healer?”

“That fucks us the most,” she said.

“That’s all for your fancy detective work?” The man clicked his tongue. “17 years of field work experience my ass.” He said something else Nico couldn’t hear. “Tan, any news?”

“It swung away, sir, four times, from branch to branch,” Tan responded, climbing down, then climbing up to the last tree Kara had swung from. “I don’t know where she landed on the fifth swing. There were no marks or landing place. Either it swung way out of distance, or it grew wings and flew away. The one thing I do know is that it must have gone straight. It looks like it’s going back towards the 3rd City.”

“Bugger that,” the woman said. “It’s the Nightmare for gods sakes. If we can track it, that means it let us. Oren, this is beyond our pay grade. We shouldn’t follow it blindly.”

“We can’t let it escape,” Oren replied. “We’ll be a mockery if we let the key to the Deep escape after all it did.”

“We still have injured to rescue,” a fourth man said. “We just need to find and get them back to the City. It’ll do more good than dying for nothing.”

“You think the House will take responsibility for any of that? Even if the monsters hadn’t gotten to them, and we get past the monsters around them, it’ll take months for them to heal. By then they’ll be out of work and without Energy—no, they’re good as dead. We’re going for the Nightmare at least. We’ll get paid good—“

“But they’re not,” the same man replied. “They have life insurance. We can argue with the Syndicate if the Iron House refu—”

“It doesn’t matter!” he yelled. “We have to find it before anyone else does, figure out how it controls the Deep, and not only will we keep our livelihoods, but we might even become something greater,” he said, nodding to himself. “It’s badly injured. This is our chance.”

“I would rather keep our lives,” the woman said, sighing. “But that might just be me and everyone but you.”

“Tan,” Oren said. “Let the others know the Nightmare is moving during the day. It’s booking a path back to the 3rd City. Tell them to set up parameters.”

An arrow went up to the sky, creating a particular sound Nico hadn’t a clue what it meant. Their voices soon faded away.

“I must say—”

“Don’t,” Kara said.

“Nightmare is a cool name and all, but it really doesn’t fit,” Nico said, nudging her elbow. When she spoke there wasn’t much terror, just a slight sense of fatigue from the slow way she pronounced her syllables.

Kara left cover. She moved towards the right of where they had been going previously. It wasn’t in the direction of the city. Nico looked at the orange mountain ahead. Uh-oh, I think I see where this is going. She fought because she wanted to make a false trail.

They didn’t even know Kara’s gender yet, much less what Rank she was. They won’t expect for her to hunt a Rank II or even Rank III Boss. If the timing is right, they might even find a squad doing the Boss themselves.

So she does want to Rank up.

Kara rested her back against a tree. She pointed at an opposing one that Nico went towards. A few moments later he spied a few fairies flying past. Kara left shortly after, mostly sticking to the shadows of trees, and occasionally directing Nico where to hide or step.

Nico found that the way Kara moved was at odds with how she fought. She walked with a slight, lazy hunch. Her head bobbed forward on slacked shoulders, completely lax and free of tension.

Her left arm hung limply by her side, swinging freely with her steps. She moved at a languid, unhurried pace. She didn’t slow down when she wanted to stop, she just turned around and let the tree lightly catch her.

Even as monsters drew near them she barely reacted. While Nico’s heart beat louder and his body stiffened up, Kara simply waited.

She ducked below a low hanging branch that was half separated from its trunk. The other branches it was interwoven went down with it, causing a small area of the ground to be riddled with sharp metal spikes.

Nico didn’t need to lower his head to avoid getting hit, yet another proof of his superior height. “Can I ask you one—”

“For every question you ask, you’ll ask three more,” she said.

“—that I will ask within the next 10 minutes,” he said.

“20,” she said.

“Pardon?”

“You’ll stay quiet for 20 minutes.”

Nico resisted the urge to haggle. He nodded. “What exactly do you want to do?”

“Kill the Deep,” she said, her voice stale. She spoke with such little enthusiasm it made Nico doubt whether she was serious or not. She unhooked the sword and offered it to Nico.

“Oh,” he whispered, swallowing. His lips felt dry. “Yeah, that’s a lot more than three questions.” Saying she’ll kill the Deep was like saying she’ll cut down a mountain. It’s not something anyone said. He looked behind him, recalling the damage she wrought in a day. It gave her words more credibility than he’d thought. “And no, I’m not taking it.”

She hooked the sword and went towards the Bronze Fields, where the Deep directly traveled.

***

Nico and Kara laid against a mound. To their front was one mounted Rider, and two on foot. In the center was a 3-star. It was comically oversized for its alligator with a bulky, squarish body type that was nearly as wide as it was tall. Three mushrooms grew on its forearm, two on its shoulders, and a few more on its warty belly. On the back of each hand grew a gray mushroom.

Vogrant Rider

Energy: 6/6

Shields: ***

Trait: Fungai Growth (Uncommon)

Grows mushrooms on your body that contain the effects of your skills. The mushrooms will activate upon being plucked out.

1st Skill: Fragmentation Blast (Common III)

Consumes 1 Energy to unleash a wide, short-range blast.

Cast-time: Charge 2-6 seconds Deals up to 3 Shield damage and gains 3 meters effective range per 2 seconds Charged.

Cooldown: 6 seconds.

2nd Skill Kinetic Burst (Rare III)

Transmutes 1 Energy to provide 3 Charges of a burst of Kinetic Energy. These last 3 seconds.

Cooldown: 1 second

3rd Skill: Flesh Shield (Uncommon III)

For every minute you do not take damage gain 1 Shield up to 3 Shield. Your first Shield has Moderate resistance to all damage.

“Say, don’t you find it odd,” he said, resting his head against the warm dirt. “That the Deep’s monsters are so hideous?” Their unflattering frog heads and warty skin wasn’t an outlier. Most monsters looked too monstrous in Nico’s opinion, with too many teeth for their own good. Natural selection should have faded out those asymmetric traits over time.

Kara nudged her head in their direction. “Go kill them.”

“One second.” Nico looked over the mound, then at himself. “Yup—still five of them and one of little old me.”

“You’re counting their mounts?”

“You weren’t?”

Kara moved to the next mound. He followed her close enough to almost trip on her heels. “Why do you want me to fight them, actually?” Nico asked, not expecting and not getting an answer.

“Why were you chosen to carry the Locust?” she said.

“I’m cute and I can juggle,” Nico said. He didn’t know what type of reaction he would get. He got none. He sighed. You’re no fun. And here he thought that someone that was going to fight against all of humanity would be the fun type. “I’m kidding—I can’t juggle. I can heal, but I’m sure the one that picked me had more reasons.” And hostages.”

Kara nodded. “We’ll feed you to the monsters.”

“Pardon?”

“Throw it.”

Nico swallowed. No pressure. He jumped up and swung, tossing one shell in the center of the group. The Riders flew off the alligators, one to the side, one away from them, and one towards Kara who ran out, slicing it in half from the waist up mid-air. She brought her sword down, stabbing its alligator through the brain.

Nico reached the Rider that was pushed to the side. He got to it when it was on its knees and hands. With both hands he swung the axe down, snapping its neck in one chop. He left it and went towards the Vogrant that Kara was running towards.

The Vogrant was a heavy monster. The Kinetic Shell only managed to knock it off its feet. It got up and placed both hands under its overturned alligator. With a sound much like a Kinetic Shell resounding from its arms, the alligator was flung into the air towards Kara, its tail waggling and its mouth open wide in confusion.

Kara went straight at it, sheathing her blade and sliding forward. She was flat on her back when the alligator was above her. She touched the alligator’s scales with her left hand. It made her gain a sudden burst of speed forward, closing the distance between her and the Vogrant. She rose into a crouch in front of it just as it ripped off a mushroom.

Slashing up from that position should have been impossible, but Kara wasn’t slashing. She was firing a cannon. The moment her left hand hooked behind her to catch the scabbard her blade was freed from its entrapment. It made a full circle, rising Kara to her feet and turning her towards the Vogrant. She was right in its face, and her blade was pointing towards its feet.

The Vogran’s arm dropped from the elbow down. It didn’t care, or it didn’t notice, and swung its other fist at Kara, bursting a mushroom on the back of its shoulder for even more speed and power.

Kara was at least two feet taller than it, yet she still managed to lean back under it. She stabbed the Vogrant in its knee and jumped up, kicking the Vogrant with both feet. She flipped backwards, sheathing her blade mid-air, and landing on her back. She rolled backwards so smoothly there was no sound.

As for Nico, he’d jumped over the alligator when it struck the ground. He was in mid-air when he realized that the mushroom the Vogrant dropped was activated, and that the other Rider that was blasted away had tossed another mushroom.

I’ll probably live. He hid his face behind his forearms and brought his knees to his elbows, protecting his head as best as he could as he fell directly towards the exploding mushrooms.