As soon as she caught up with the group, Elania mentioned the eyes. Much to her chagrin, the blue orbs had disappeared, and Taniel added a biting remark about scared girls. The rest weren’t any better, suggesting that she had been seeing things.

She thought she had seen the shape of two dogs behind the eyes, but in the shifting shadows of the caverns, it had been too hard for her to tell even with her [Darkvision] making things easier. The group's dismissiveness didn’t stop her from glancing back every so often, and she still felt like they were being watched.

The first thing to come to mind was the Ash Hounds from the Prancer, they certainly had not made any attempt to hide their fixation on her, but she didn’t know why they would be following her. If they were contracted to the Innkeeper shouldn’t they have been back at the Inn with him? She had assumed that since they were hounds and were kept in the Tavern as some type of pet or guard animal.

Despite the constant feeling of being followed and watched, nothing happened, and Elania started to feel a bit silly. When the first traveler met them coming in the opposite direction, she tensed, but the others didn’t react, and she realized that this close to the City, they would likely start seeing more and more other travelers.

They met several others along the way, and other than a customary greeting or acknowledgment, no one stopped. Elania was starting to feel some anticipation at reaching Neftasu, when a sudden growl brought the party to a halt.

One of the Ash Hounds stepped out from around a corner, its blue eyes standing out starkly against the bioluminescent cave walls. The frame of a large man that would tower over everyone she had seen so far followed. He had a thick beard dusted with specs of gray, and was clad in a set of light leather armor. In one hand he carried a large iron banded club.

[Innkeeper – Human – Lvl 487]

Elania was suddenly struck by a feeling of being oppressed, the lightweight feeling she had being pulled away by a sudden new burden. She wasn’t the only one to suddenly tense up, and the novices suddenly crumpled onto their knees. Only Marcus seemed to be unaffected, and one of the ranger’s hands went to his sword belt.

‘The Innkeeper is using an aura on us.’

Elania flicked her own aura on in response, and the crushing feeling suddenly melted away, although the two novices collapsed the rest of the way. Tanyan and Taniel looked back at her both with pained expressions, but didn’t say anything.

The look on the Innkeeper’s face was scary and he levered the huge club onto his shoulder as he continued to approach, the second demon hound suddenly leaping out from behind a rock and joining at his heels. The other hound snarled and shook its head as it began to let out a low growl. The huge man covered half the distance between them at the slow nonchalant walk before Marcus took a step forward and held up a hand.

“That’s close enough.”

The Innkeeper stopped, the club coming down to thump heavily onto the ground as he planted the head of it in front of him.

“Marcus, unless ye’ve been hired to protect the thief on yer coattails, step aside.”

Elania’s mind was set racing. He was after her. She hadn’t done or stolen anything that she knew of though.

“You’ve got the wrong group, Innkeeper.” Tanyan stepped forward, shaking off the two auras, although a hint of pain tinged his voice, “We’ve nothing of yours.”

“Oh aye, ye’ve nothing of mine.” The Innkeeper leveled a finger directly at Elania, “She’s got a belly full o’ it though, and skipped out just a tid bit ago without paying for it. That’s what I’ve come to collect, ‘n interest to boot.”

“I didn’t, Marcus...” Elania felt a sinking feeling in her stomach as the mercenary grinned at her. “He...” She managed to stammer out an approximation of the events from her point of view, but the man held up a hand and silenced her.

“Yer the one that ate, and Shelly told me yer the one that ordered it. Now, I cannae let any o’ me patrons skip off without paying.” The Innkeeper began closing the distance again, and Elania could feel the pressure of his stare as he bore down on her.

“Wai---” Tanyan started to speak when one of the Ash Hounds cut him off with a growl and positioned itself in front of him. The holy monk stepped back, and Taniel put a hand on his shoulder and shook his head.

“Not our fight.”

A cold numbness filled Elania. She knew Marcus had set her up for this, and Taniel’s refusal on behalf of the monks was another betrayal that she had suspected. Deep down, she had hoped that Marcus’ warning earlier would have been wrong, but now she knew just how shallow their comradery had been, if it even existed in the first place.

Tanyan didn’t give up though, and he fished in his pocket and pulled out a coin.

“Here! We’ll pay for her. She obviously didn’t skip out on purpose, sir.”

The man didn’t stop or even look at Tanyan as he continued forward straight toward Elania, “I don’t want yer coin, monk. If’n we ‘er in the Waypost she’d be subject ‘o the law o’ The Guard, but ‘ere on the outskirt, the aggrieved is their own ultimate justiciar ‘en juror. Unbound like ‘er has more value as a servant ‘n lesson than yer coin.”

Elania gave the monk a weak smile. Well, at least he had tried the simplest form of appeasement, but she knew he wasn’t going to break rank actually to fight for her. The monk looked about to protest the Innkeeper’s words, but a vicious snarl from the hound silenced him. Both hounds had positioned themselves ready to deal with the monks if they dared to intervene anyway.

“Princess.”

A screen appeared in front of her. A contract offer. So this was his plan.

All the other roiling emotions that had been paralyzing her were replaced by a cold anger as she scanned the proposal. It was exactly what she had suspected of the bastard.

“Fuck you.”

Elania flipped the screen and all but threw it back at him, wishing the red text would smash into his face. The only satisfaction she got was the surprise at her rejection. Oh, the contract wasn’t the worst possible contract, but it left enough hooks that he’d be able to make her into nothing but a slave the more he ‘assisted’ her. Maybe he thought he had been more subtle, or she was too stupid to realize that.

Running seemed like a futile thing, as the Innkeeper came to a stop a short distance away. She could feel the strength rolling off the man. She was sure he was stronger than Marcus, and both wanted her.

“Contract. Accept it,” the Innkeeper said.

The window appeared again, and she read it. It was not nearly as bad as the one Marcus had sent her. It promised that she’d be treated well and protected, and she’d serve the same role as Shelly, the waitress, without any ‘extra’ duties. He’d supply all the essence she needed to live. The problem was the duration as she wasn’t sure just how many years the old man was going to live.

Still... she considered it. She found herself reassessing the man. He wasn’t as bad as she first thought, lumping him in the same category as Marcus. Although it was still slavery.

“The duration and cance---”

“Accept,” As soon as she started to try and negotiate, he stepped forward his large hand coming down to clamp on her shoulder painfully. He was going to try and force her to his will. Elania’s entire body clenched as a searing hatred of all of them took hold of her. She had had enough of everything.

Marcus and the Innkeeper were impossibly strong; she didn’t have a fraction of their raw skills or experience. All she had was one single trump card and surprise. She was still able to feel the fuzzy existence of the Mana Shard in her pack, and she yanked as hard as she could on all the power that was still inside of it.

[Power: 432/208]

Her hud suddenly turned red in the corner of her view, the sudden influx of Power setting her insides on fire. She didn’t just feel it; she could see the red of her eyes reflecting off the Innkeeper’s sudden surprise.

The man reacted impossibly fast and the pain from her shoulder suddenly doubled into agony as she felt herself being lifted into the air as he prepared to fling her away. But he had stepped so dangerously close...

Elania focused everything into her fist as she swung at him. She forced all her power into it, turning her hand into a temporary star of light.

It was over in an instant, a red squelch erupting through the tunnel in an explosive spray that covered everything.

“Sweet Divines!”

Her forearm was gone.

So was the center of the Innkeeper’s torso.

The pressure crushing her shoulder stopped, and suddenly she had to hold onto his arm to keep from flying away as she reached the top of the arc he had been about to fling her through. For a single weightless moment, she caught the blank look of death on the man’s face. She didn’t even know his name.

The timeless moment ended, and she landed on the bloody corpse with a bounce, barely managing to protect her face with her good arm.

“Fuck!”

Elania looked up as she recovered and watched as the two demon hounds attacked. The red fury in their eyes shined like hot coals as they rushed forward together. One lunged for Tanyan, and Taniel intercepted it with a glowing fist. The other was rushing for her.

It did not get far as Marcus was suddenly there planting a dagger through its neck, eliciting another viscous spray of blood across the stone. A white orb flew from Tanyan’s hand that homed in on the other hound as it tried to dodge Taniel’s attacks. Snarls turned to yelps as it was suddenly covered in the white light, and then it ceased moving altogether.

[Power: 33/212]

She was tapped; she’d dumped almost four hundred power into the man’s chest. The blood pouring out of her arm slowed to a stop, but the pain of [Regeneration] flaring and rebuilding it didn’t come.

[Your physical status is degrading!]

[Your Power is insufficient for Regeneration! Your body will heal slower.]

The pain made it hard to think, and reading the expanding cloud of messages was impossible, so she swiped them all away. What she was focusing on was more important.

Marcus was staring at her, and so was Tanyan and Taniel. Marcus had stopped the hound, which had helped her, but she saw the sudden flicker in his eyes, and she felt like she could almost read his thoughts. He didn’t see her as a toy to play with anymore but as a danger.

He started to reach for his bow off his back, and Elania knew exactly what he could do with it from the fight with the Manzitore.

She hadn’t seen the prompt, but she didn’t need to see it. She slammed her intent into the Innkeeper’s corpse to absorb his Power. The [System] response was almost eager in its rush to oblige as the entire area that was splattered with his gore began to mist over. Elania could feel the fountain of Power flowing over and into her. The flow didn’t finish immediately, either. It was providing a rapid but steady tick of Power, as evidenced by her self-made Hud.

[Power: 55/212]

[Power: 77/212]

[Power: 99/212]

[Power: 111/212]

[Power: 140/212]

Marcus was already reaching for an arrow, and Elania realized she had to act. The ranged attack she could do was wholly inadequate. It was so much less potent than the close-range one was, and she knew she’d never make it close enough to reach the ranger.

Her gaze slid to the two unconscious forms nearby.

“Wait!”

“Stop!”

Elania ignored the chaotic shouts, she didn’t have time to hesitate, and she launched herself through the air, landing with a slide before lifting one of the novices up into her lap and turning back toward the others.

Marcus had his arrow trained on her, but she had just barely made it in time. A strap on one of the bulky baskets of Glow Moss snapped off the man’s back as she hugged him tightly to her chest, and then she reached up and broke off the wicker lid that held the highly reactive Glow Moss inside. The green glow escaped casting her and the novices in an eerie light.

“One spark and all your moss and the novices will melt away,” Elania’s voice came out cold and calm, which was terrifying to her. “Put it down.”

Much to her relief Marcus complied, although he kept his bow out. Taniel and Tanyan looked at her in shock.

The sudden flaring pain in her stump was a reminder of the damage she’d already received, and when she read the number on her Hud she realized she might be in trouble.

[Power: 379/216]

[Your body is experiencing thermal degradation!]

[Your body is slightly adapting.]

[You have gained a level in Demonic Aura!]

[Due to your high power, Regeneration is enhanced!]

[Due to your excess power, your body is exceeding its limits!]

[Your body has greatly exceeded the limit of its capacity for power!]

[Find a stronger body or reduce your current power!]

It was still ticking up. She couldn’t feel the Mana Shard in her pack either, although she hadn’t yet figured out how to fill the damned thing even if it wasn’t dust in her pack. She bit down on her lip as the pain in her stump intensified, and she quickly pointed it away from the baskets when motes of yellow-white energy started to float off of it as it began to reknit itself.

Apparently, the process became more flashy the higher over the cap she was. At least it seemed the effort was slowing down the speed of how fast her Power was still rising. She realized the mist was still pooling, and she hoped suddenly that the amount of mist didn’t represent just how much Power she was expected to absorb.

“Over 200%!”

“That’s not possible, they can’t exceed their maximum.”

“She’s obviously doing it.”

“What is she?”

Elania wasn’t sure who the voices belonged to, but in the combat's lull with her focus being torn away by the sudden ‘healing’ that didn’t seem as important as breaking the standoff with her still being alive at the end.

She had the tools she needed, and they understood the concept of hostages. Elania pulled up her contract menu and began to edit. Creating a loophole-proof legal document while her arm was reknitting itself into existence and her insides were melting was not a simple task, but she gritted her teeth and focused. She kept it simple out of necessity.

[Contractor: Elania Reyes]

[Contractee: Tanyan]

[Duration: Until Contract Termination]

[Essence Upkeep: Contractee 0.04/hr]

[Contractor Requirements]

Contractor shall make every reasonable attempt not to harm Contractee’s group or goods.

Contractor may terminate the contract at any time.

[Contractee Requirements]

Contractee shall provide Contractor with sufficient essence to sustain them for the contract's duration.

Contractee shall prevent members of the Conclave or Mercenary guild from harming the Contractor for the contract’s duration.

Contractee may terminate the contract in a public place in the City of Neftasu while the Contractor is not in any current danger.

[Contractor Penalty Clause]

Contractor shall forfeit their life immediately upon failure or any violation of their requirements.

[Contractee Penalty Clause]

Contractee shall forfeit their life and soul immediately upon failure or any violation of their requirements.

Her vision was blurring with tears from the pain, but she pulled her hand out of the [Glow-Moss] basket and pushed the contract toward Tanyan before rubbing at her face. As the screen reached him, she saw his eyes widen, and he began to read it.

She didn’t have any effort to spare for threats or more gestures. She saw the first bits of skin on her good arm beginning to float away, small motes of yellow light flaking off into the air. Her Hud had stopped working at some point, and she realized that her forearm had fully restored itself. The pain was from the excess Power. One of the motes of light landed in a novice’s hair, and she realized it would take just one of those landing on some of the Moss to end the three of them. She looked up to Tanyan.

Marcus and Taniel were yelling at him, but he looked up at her at the same time she lifted her head.

“Ok. I accept.”

Ding!

[You have gained a level in Contracting!]

[You have been reclassified as a Manager.]

[You have unlocked the Contract Management Screen!]

[You have gained the title Contractor!]

[You have 1 Contractee.]