Gunnar tensed all over. Even with a gag on, Leilani made a lot of noise. What the hell was she doing? The guard growled as he strode over to her.

“Shut up!” Brutus hissed.

Leilani grunted fiercely as he neared, her wide eyes on the corridor.

But Leilani shook her head and kept looking at the passage. Perhaps Zeda had been the one to orchestrate the supposed creatures at the wall, but the guard was still on edge. Considering how much destruction was going on in the city, Gunnar couldn’t blame him.

“Alright, alright, enough,” Brutus muttered and, to Gunnar’s amazement, began to walk over towards the hall. Gunnar sunk into the shadows, but Brutus didn’t look his way. He strode straight to the hall, where Leilani was staring, and peered down it, his back turned to Gunnar.

Gunnar rushed forward, drawing his Nightblade. In one motion, Gunnar wrapped one hand around Brutus’s mouth and jerked back his head, while the other drew the blade swiftly across the guard’s throat.

[Critical Hit! You have dealt +80 Damage to Brutus the Rogue!]

[You have triggered the effect Mortal Bleeding!]

The man slumped to his knees and blood poured from his throat. He tried to speak, but foamy blood gurgled from his lips. With a twist of the neck, Gunnar finished him off.

Unlocked Skill: Neck Snapping

Skill Type: Physical, Combat

Linked Attribute: Strength (+60% Development)

Affinity Level: 11

Requirements: A hand on either side of the head and a good old-fashioned twist-er-roo

Cost: 20 Stamina

Description: Use Neck Snapping to finish off a kill without all the blood and gore. Or do a little of both, just to shake it up, if you’re a total barbarian.

[You have dealt +60 Damage to Brutus the Rogue!]

[ Friendly Fire! You have defeated an ally. Here’s -20 XP!]

What? He’s the traitor! That’s bullshit!

Gunnar quickly looted a flintlock pistol and a tiny bag of powder, along with a few Lesser Soul Gems, and a Health and Mana potion, which were welcome additions after all he’d used up healing from his burns in the tower.

Leilani’s muffled grunts reminded him to hurry. First, Gunnar set to work on her bindings. But no matter what he did, he could not get the knot undone. He tried a blade, but couldn’t cut through it. Leilani shook her head, offering a few more grunts, and Gunnar removed her gag, which came off no problem.

The mistress took a deep breath as though she had just surfaced from a deep dive. Her voice was barely a whisper and her words came in small rushes of syllables between shallow breaths. Even so, it was as inviting and reassuring as ever. “You’re a… welcome sight, Ashwood…but those are… sorcerous bindings… only the proper incantation… can remove them.”

“Can you do it?”

“If I could… I would not still… be here.”

“Sorry, I guess not.”

Leilani’s chest heaved, and it was only then that Gunnar realized how hard she was panting, despite having been presumably sitting in place for quite sometime. It wasn’t just the relief of losing the gag. She was out of breath, as though she’d been running for miles, and her forehead was drenched in sweat.

The mistress dipped her chin toward her chest. A shimmering necklace with a purple amulet hung from her slender neck.

“That’s not jewelry,” Gunnar said.

“No,” Leilani said softly. “That is my… true binding.”

Gunnar reached for the chain at her neck. Her skin was cold to the touch.

“Careful,” she said. “Don’t let the… jewel touch you.”

The necklace’s clasp released, and Gunnar carefully lifted the amulet from Leilani’s skin.

Amulet of the Fallen

Item Class: Mythic, Elven-crafted

Quality: Above average

Weight: 0.5

Durability: 28

Effect: Drains all Mana from the wearer

Description: Fashioned by the dusk elves during the Great Mage Wars, in the age preceding that of the Reddik Empire. These rare jewels are illegal, powered by dark magic, and very effective for enemies.

The necklace thrummed with power, as though there were a tiny motor whirring inside. Gunnar’s fingers trembled until he successfully stowed the necklace in his Inventory.

Change swept over Leilani’s complexion in an instant, her cheeks growing flushed and her entire body straightening with renewed strength. She leaned her head against the chair back and sighed with eyes closed, a strangely tantalizing act that made Gunnar feel uncomfortable and just a little turned on at the same time.

“Aah!” Leilani’s Mana and Stamina bars began to slowly replenish.

“Do you, er, need a potion?” Gunnar asked.

Leilani inclined her head and offered only a slight nod in response. Gunnar held a Stamina potion to her lips and gently poured the liquid into her mouth. Then, he retrieved his only Mana potion and held it up.

“Gunnar! No!”

The voice came from the balcony above, and the fact that he’d been called by name threw him off. His entire body went rigid in an instant.

Gunnar glanced up to find Master Zeda at the railing, hand outstretched desperately toward him. Everything slowed to a crawl. His gut wrenched, though he didn’t understand what the hell was going on.

Zeda hadn’t shot at him.

He had called him by name.

That made no sense.

Instinctively—and strangely, obediently—he jerked back his hand from Leilani’s mouth. But the vial did not come with it.

Leilani clamped down on the narrow mouth of the vial with her teeth, tilted back her head and downed the Mana potion in one gulp.

A shot fired from above, and Gunnar dropped to the hardwood floor.

But the shot was not meant for him.

Leilani cried out with rage, blood spreading across her shoulder from the wound.

And for an instant, Gunnar was relieved. He couldn’t explain it. Wasn’t she the victim here?

Another shot fired from above.

But Leilani was not hit a second time.

Gunnar’s stomach felt hollow and aching as he glanced up. And he feared he’d made a terrible mistake

The musket ball was frozen in mid-air, right in front of Leilani’s chest. More shots rained down, and Gunnar scrambled for the protection of the staircase, the vision of Zeda and three Rogues firing with desperate terror seared in his brain.

After several more, the shots ceased, and he dared to glance back.

Threads of glowing sapphire magic extended from all over Leilani’s body, like hundreds of wispy protective hands, warding off the onslaught. Dozens of blazing bullets were suspended in the air as though time itself had stopped.

There was a moment of deathly silence. The smoke was so thick up in the balcony from the gunfire, Gunnar could hardly make out the forms of the men.

But Leilani glowed like some sort of dark angel in the pre-dawn gloom. Her hands were free. Her bindings had frayed as though made of spiderwebs, now left dangling in threads from the chair.

Leilani let out a furious shriek, and the bullets that had been fired at her reversed course with an explosion of magic and shot back toward the attackers. One of the Rogues toppled over the railing, and Gunnar heard the thuds of several others as they collapsed on the floor.

Gunnar shuddered at the horrifying display of power. Leilani strode up the stairs. Amidst the settling smoke, Gunnar saw Zeda rise from the ground against his own will. Threads of magic wrapped around the master’s body, and he hovered above the railing and out over the center of the room.

Zeda glared defiantly at Leilani. “You fucking traitor!”

“I did what was best for the guild,” Leilani whispered cooly.

“You’ve destroyed the guild,” Zeda said through clenched teeth.

Leilani squeaked with an almost childish giggle. “The guild is not destroyed. It is rid of fools like you. Now, it can thrive in a city ripe for a new era.”

“An era of dark magic?” Zeda cried.

“It’s time for the old ways to return to Thailen. And then, to the rest of the world.”

Gunnar marveled at what was happening. He had to remind himself that this was just a storyline in a very real feeling VR game. This was a twist in the fate of Thailen. And his own fate too.

Leilani’s lips twisted into a dark smile, Zeda still suspended over the balcony. The man opened his mouth to protest once more, but he never elicited a sound. In a rush of magic, Zeda shot to the ground, crumpling into a mass of blood and twisted limbs on the marble floors.

[Nighthawk Guild Master Zeda has been killed by a traitor!]

A dark realization came over Gunnar. There had been no guild-wide notification when Leilani had been captured, because she had been the traitor. Zeda must have figured it out and captured her somehow.

By saving her, Gunnar had betrayed the guild.

But in a strange way, everything that had happened had led to this. The First One had told him to find a dark mage, and it turned out, he had been serving one this whole time.

This was the path he was supposed to follow.

Gunnar felt his body go weightless, and he rose from the floor to face Leilani.