The [Ice Wall] fell, pulled back into its constituent mana by its creator. As it collapsed into motes of light, Faye was already darting through the remnants of ice, tiny crystals that she brushed past and knocked outward. It was as if she had punched through with her body.

The small ice hut that Gavan had made to shelter them was surrounded by monsters.

Just as Faye was clear of the walls, her flaming sword swung around in a wide arc, and Faye threw out three [Blades of Flame] as she swung in a wide horizontal slash. The spells slammed out into the waiting bodies of the night stalkers on all sides.

Two flinched and dart away from further fiery attacks, but the third was unfortunate enough to get caught with [Ignited]. Its whole body came alive with flames that licked across its night-black skin.

With a screech, that night stalker threw itself at Faye. She grinned and ducked down to rise with an attack that cleaved the night stalker in two.

Congratulations! You have defeated a level 15 [Night Stalker].

Experience awarded.

The notification ding was like the starting bell of a boxing fight. The other stalkers started flinging themselves forward. Faye did not even think, she just let her muscle memory and instinct take over. There were too many coming too fast for her to think about what she had to do.

Minute twitches of her [Mana Sense] had her reversing direction and slashing at something that she could not consciously comprehend before the afterimage of her flaming sword slashed through the air and cut down an attacking stalker.

Another two notifications pinged in as many seconds, and Faye pushed them away.

Something slammed into her back, tearing at her with claws that were sharp enough for her feel them through her gambeson.

“Duck!” came Gavan’s voice, and Faye obeyed in an instant.

A flare of Gavan’s mana saw him unleash a barrage of [Fire Dart]s that took down not only the night stalker perched on Faye’s back, but a couple of others that were coming closer.

With a moment to breathe, Faye looked around and saw that there were still over a dozen of the monsters in the clearing around their ice hut.

What was more disturbing was that she was unable to see whatever had been making the cracks in their defences only a few moments before.

Then the cat-like monsters were enveloping her once more and she had to duck back into a swirling fighting pattern that did not give her room to wonder about missing monsters.

A few claws got through her defences. The night stalkers were clearly speed oriented, their own defence lacking, and they were able to snake their lithe arms through the slightest gap and slice at Faye’s limbs, hands, or face.

More than one had leapt at her face, too, all four sets of limbs bristling with claws that were ready to rend flesh from her skull. The first that had tried it got closest, Faye had to dodge out of its path and scramble to throw a [Fire Dart] at it as it landed.

The second one saw the success of its brethren and attempted to copy the leap, but Faye was ready for it and she cut it down with ease. After she defeated that one, she saw that three of the stalkers peeled off from attacking her and went after Gavan. He was already beset by two that were trying to get into the remains of their hut, and other two were on top of the hut, thinking about dropping into the opening.

Faye spun in a wide arc, throwing her blade out in a swing that gave her some breathing room. In that space, she pointed her left hand at the stalkers on the roof of the hut. [Scorching Lance] erupted from the focal point in front of her hand and speared one of the stalkers, instantly vaporising it.

With a thought, Faye checked her remaining mana. Though she was improving her spell control and mana pool every level and each time she practised, her spells were undoubtedly expensive and she could not cast them this rapidly and expect to remain topped off with mana. She had already burned through over half of her reserves.

The four stalkers closest to Faye snarled and came slinking in, trying to bite and swipe at her legs. Not wanting to play that game, Faye leapt over one of them, gaining a claw to her calf for her troubles, and she sprinted toward the ones trying to attack the mage.

She laid into the small pack like a wildfire, her sword flashing left and right. Notifications pinged. Gavan held up his hands and let loose a cone of tiny, vicious [Ice Shard]s that tore through the remaining night stalkers like bird shot through a paper target.

Faye’s action against the night stalkers near the hut had brought her into a place that let her see around the hut for the first time. Her eyes widened as she caught sight of the monsters on the other side of the hut.

Following the same general shape of the night stalkers, but standing at over two metres tall, there were a trio of what Faye could not help but think of as pack leaders.

Each one followed Faye with their disturbing, predatory gaze. The flames of her sword reflected their eyes back at her, shining a piercing green.

One of the monsters blinked and stood up from its seat, shaking itself out like a dog. It had a tail, unlike the smaller night stalkers, and it whipped out behind the pack leader with a crack.

“Shit,” she cursed and retreated back to the entrance of the ice hut.

“What was that?” Gavan asked, as he pointed a finger at a night stalker outside and launched a [Fire Dart].

“Massive monster, some kind of pack leader? Three of them, only one is moving.”

“Probably one of the brutes that was trying to open us up, before.”

Faye nodded. “I’m not convinced I can take it.”

“Well—”

But whatever Gavan was going to say was lost as four night stalkers rushed the entrance and forced their way inside. They instantly spread out, displaying a fierce intelligence that rocked Faye’s estimation of the monsters.

Without much time to consider the implications, Faye lashed out. [Blades of Flame] caught one of the stalkers, burning it and pushing it into the wall for a moment, and her swing caught another as it rounded on her in an attempt to hamstring her.

The first had recovered almost immediately, and it surged forward to try and latch onto Faye’s left arm. The other came in at the same time, snaking around her leg to bite the back of her thigh.

She cried out at the bite, and slammed a fist already half-encased in flames at the first one, exploding the gathering of mana there in a brutal, excessive attack that was not a spell and more a brute force solution to a problem.

The pressure on the back of her leg vanished and the night stalker that had been latched on flew back from Faye with a large icicle embedded in its ribs. A moment later, Gavan’s healing energies swarmed into her and she realised with a panic that the pain in her leg had gone from so painful she had blocked it out, painful enough to make her limp.

The adrenaline pumping through her body gave her the shakes, her vision was bright, and her heart vibrated in her chest. Sweat fell into her eyes as she took in the scene inside the hut. One of the stalkers was still alive, but it was trying to crawl to the exit; it has lost the use of its hind legs.

Gavan himself was still standing, but he was panting, and the side of his face was covered in blood.

The pack leader was inside the hut before Faye knew what was happening.

Its huge bulk barely fit through the hole in the wall, but it made it and its huge arm rose for a savage slash on Gavan’s unprotected body. Faye screamed. Gavan screamed.

The huge black claw slammed into Gavan.

He collapsed in a veritable explosion of blood.

Faye carried on her wordless scream of horror. She reached back with her blade and without thinking it through — she could only think about healing Gavan, making sure that he was okay, getting the huge monster of a night stalker away from him, protecting her friend.

She pushed more mana into her blade, the flames that made up its fiery corona took on a fiercer hue. But with no more time to think, only action remained.

Faye brought the sword up and over, more like she were swinging a hammer onto an anvil than wielding a precise blade like a bastard sword. The remaining mana inside of her flared alongside her emotions and cascaded along the metal of the sword.

When her sword came into sight, the flames along its length had transformed. Instead of simply creating an outline around the sword of fire, the flames had elongated and changed intensity. They were so hot as to be white. The white flames had formed an additional length of blade, impossibly long, and wider than the sword she wielded.

As her sword came down, so too did the white-hot blade of fire.

Faye could not hear anything over the roaring of blood in her ears. She could barely see anything beyond the glorious white heat of the blade of fire.

But, as her vision cleared, and her sense of hearing returned, Faye saw that she was alone in the hut. The stalkers had vanished from the opening. The pack leader lay half-inside the hut, slain by her single blow.

Then, Faye passed out.

Faye floated.

It would have been a pleasant dream if it was not for the awful vision of Gavan lying in a pool of blood…

Gavan!

She dropped like stone.

Waking up with a start, Faye sat straight up with a gasp.

The ice hut was whole once more.

“How?” she muttered and immediately regretted it, as the sound of her own voice hurt her head. She cradled her forehead with both hands, gasping in pain.

“Here,” came a quiet whisper.

Faye flinched, and again when that movement hurt more, and stared in shock as Gavan gave her a mug of water. She squinted at him through the migraine that had her in its grip.

“Gavan?” she whispered. You were dead, she could not say.

“I’m okay.”

But she could see how pale he was, his face drawn in pain as he moved.

“Sit down,” she whispered. “You’re hurt.”

“No, I’m just… drained.”

“What happened?” she asked, trying to sort through her vague memories.

“Not sure,” was his response. “I remember the, what did you call that thing, the pack leader, suddenly in front of my face. I saw the claw.” He shuddered.

“It… got you,” she said. He turned to stare at her, eyes haunted. “I saw you fall. I was so angry, so… scared. I, I…” she grimaced and rubbed her temples. “I did something new.”

Faye thought status, and through the pain in her head, looked at the information the system gave her.

~ Status ~

[Name:] Faye Weaver

[Class:] Spellsword

[Level:] 14

[Aspect:] n/a

[Boons:] Experience boost (x2), Sprite’s Touch

[Banes:] n/a

[Stat Growth:] Tou+2, Str+1, Rea+2, Agi+1, Int+1, Wil+3

~ Attributes ~

[Toughness:] 31

[Strength:] 28

[Reaction:] 22

[Agility:] 21

[Logic:] 10

[Intuition:] 19

[Willpower:] 28

[Charisma:] 10

[Magic:] 1.5

~ Skill List ~

[Skill Points:] 1

[Mana Sense] [Tier 1 – 2/5]

[Spellcasting — Basic] [Tier 0 – 4/5]

[Swordfighting — Intermediate] [Tier 0 – 5/5]

[Swordfighter's Sense] [Tier 0 – 5/5] [Locked]

[Survival — Basic] [Tier 0 – 4/10]

~ Spell List ~

[Fire Dart] [Tier 0 – 4/5]

[Scorching Lance] [Tier 1 – 1/5]

[Blades of Flame] [Tier 1 – 3/5]

[Cleansing Flame] [Tier 2 – 1/5]

The most obvious thing was that she had managed to level up.

“Level fourteen,” she whispered, causing Gavan to look up with a half-smile.

Her skills had changed, too. [Spellcasting — Basic] was now at the fourth level, and [Blades of Flame] had advanced to the third. That was almost enough to make her dance with joy. But the true excitement lay in the last line of the spell list.

What’s this? she asked herself. Opening the spell info provided her with a description.

~ Spell Info ~

[Tier 2]

[Cleansing Flame]

[Modifier] [Special] [Fire] [Class]

[Extreme cost] [High Damage] [High Healing]

~ Description ~

Through trials of fire, you have learned that fires can cleanse out pain and disease as much as cause it.

[Cleansing Flame] modifies other spells to add [Cleansing].

Spells modified with [Cleansing] have: [Damage] dealt to enemies increased.

Spells modified with [Cleansing] have: [Healing] dealt to allies increased.

Faye’s eyes widened as she read the description. It was completely new and referred to nothing she had learned about so far. It was also [Tier 2], which was the highest tier spell she owned.

“I have a new spell,” she whispered, grimacing through the pain in her head.

“You do?” Gavan asked, his eyes glittering.

“It’s called [Cleansing Flame].”

Gavan shook his head. “Never heard of it. What does it do?”

Faye gave him the description, word for word. Her friend stared at her for a moment, then stood up and paced back and forth a few paces whilst dragging his hands over his face.

She closed her eyes and waited for him to stop pacing, because the movement was making her feel sick.

“I can’t believe you,” Gavan said.

She kept her eyes closed, it made her feel better. “Why?” she asked.

“First of all, you apparently just invented a new spell. And, not only that,” he said, with disgust, “it’s a [Tier 2] spell!”

She flinched and Gavan cursed and lowered his voice to apologise. “Sorry, got excited. Basically, what you just did was incredible. Also, incredibly lucky. You could have ended up with anything.”

Faye shrugged. “I had no idea what I was doing. I was just so angry and scared. I lashed out.”

Gavan knelt before her and put a cooling hand on her head, and a moment later a trickle of healing entered her body, instantly relieving part of the migraine. She looked up and smiled.

“Thanks.”

Gavan nodded, seriously. “I think I owe you my life. Without this new spell, I would have died.”

Faye frowned. “But, it says that it modifies spells to gain [Healing] for allies is increased… I don’t have a healing spell.”

Gavan shrugged. “This modifier is likely much more complex than what the system is telling you right now. It probably has a healing component for allies built in, after all, increasing from nothing is still something.”

Faye scowled. “That makes no sense, multiplying zero still gets zero.”

He shrugged. “I don’t make the rules.”

“I don’t think anyone is making the rules,” Faye grumbled.

“Well, we have some breathing room now, anyway. You should rest.”

Faye looked up, surprised. “Why? There were two other pack leaders out there. Are they not still prowling around?”

Gavan shook his head. “I woke up and they were all gone. Vanished. The [Ice Wall] was still missing, and the corpse of the pack leader you killed was still lying in the opening. I guess the rest did not want to mess with you.” He grinned, then snapping his fingers as if he had just remembered something, he pointed behind her. “Oh, and it might have had something to do with that…”

Faye slowly turned to look behind her to see what he was talking about.

The [Ice Wall]s that had remained standing from their original shelter had been cloven in half from about the height Faye could reach if she were standing and the line of destruction spread up the wall and only stopped at the apex of the roof, blending into the thin gap Gavan had made in the construction.

That was not the weirdest part.

The thin opening was still on fire, and the flames were pure white.

Faye stared at the flickering flames in confusion.

“What am I looking at?”

“Oh, if I could take a guess, it’s the remains of your new spell…” Gavan said, with a laugh bubbling up under his words. “It gets better, that corpse I mentioned?”

“Yes?” she ventured, cautiously.

“That was lit up like a winter’s day bonfire when I woke up, too.”