Tracking someone without magic in a desert is akin to tracking someone swimming underwater.

It just doesn’t work in reality like it does in the movies.

Wind erases tracks, sunlight bakes clues, and any attempt at tracing the passage of a person is a fruitless endeavor of insanity.

Fortunately, there’s magic for that.Eve thought tracing the Cardinal’s mana scent across the sands easily. Spatial Step allowed her to cover the distance at a ground-devouring pace.

Two hours later Eve watched a single figure moving in the distance. Witch’s Dust mimicked the optical camouflage of her old secret squirrel squad from Earth. Even with that, Eve kept her mana signature trapped within the shielding of her dust as normal. Cardinal Rachel Morningstar demonstrated a keen knowledge that she would have pursuers. Her mana traces had split multiple times over the course of traveling. Eve might have been fooled had she been tracing only the Cardinal’s mana. However, by only following the mana that also contained ‘faith’ traces of mana it had been a cakewalk.

Examining the Cardinal revealed a wealth of information to Eve’s eyes.

Rachel Morningstar

Tier Six

Lv. 7,501

Bounty: 11B SS

Race: Half-Elf

Class: Chosen of V’nor

Profession: Priestess of V’nor

Affinities (1): Light

Interesting. Eve thought as the Cardinal floated effortlessly over the sands. She’s clearly expecting pursuers.

With an affinity like Light, the mere fact she was still in the desert screamed suspect to Eve. Listening to her gut as it doubled down on the feeling that something was wrong. Eve stopped looking at the Cardinal and instead scanned the area she was traveling through.

At first the sand appeared no different than the normal faceless desert. Under a suspicious gaze searching for something out of place though, the mana of the area slowly gave up the secret.

T’zon Drel

Tier Six

Lv. 7,500

Race: Bronze Sand Dragon

Class: Guardian of V’nor

Profession: Temple Guard

Affinities (2): Light, Bronze

T’zon Crel

Tier Six

Lv. 7,500

Race: Bronze Sand Dragon

Class: Guardian of V’nor

Profession: Temple Guard

Affinities (2): Light, Bronze

T’zon Vrel

Tier Six

Lv. 7,500

Race: Bronze Sand Dragon

Class: Guardian of V’nor

Profession: Temple Guard

Affinities (2): Light, Bronze

T’zon Zrel

Tier Six

Lv. 7,500

Race: Bronze Sand Dragon

Class: Guardian of V’nor

Profession: Temple Guard

Affinities (2): Light, Bronze

The mana signature of four separate draconic entities became visible at the cardinal points. Watching the bronze dragons Eve was able to see they maintained a constantly traveling perimeter around the Cardinal. With classes like Guardian of V’nor and Temple Guard it was clear these dragons were what gave the Cardinal confidence to wait.

Eve let a plethora of Witch’s Dust merge into the sand as she slowly followed the group. Since they were in no hurry, then using the time to prepare a wonderful play was her choice. In the first hour, Witch’s Dust multiplied endlessly behind Eve as she prepared her surprise gift. Once the amount had reached a staggering amount, she swung her hand in a swirling motion as if stirring a pot.

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The desert behind Eve erupted into motion as a titanic haboob occurred.

Dust, sand, and air combined into a massive curtain of cover. At the same time, Eve ‘painted’ her targets with Witch’s Dust to prevent their escape. The four dragons made no effort to hide any further surrounding the Cardinal before they hunkered down creating cover. Sandstone walls grew around the five enemies as the dragons used their bloodline to best effect. Eve watched as a miniature eye of the storm grew as the sandstone cover sapped any sand that touched it to created more defenses.

Unfortunately, the sandstone manipulated by the dragons also trapped Witch’s Dust into their covering structure. With a short twist of will, Eve pumped ever more dust into the defensive structure replacing the sand with her own infiltration. T’zon Zrel was the first to notice something wrong, and his eyes widened as the very desert appeared to betray the sacred bloodline.

Eve ruthlessly attacked the four dragons while forming a cuboid trap to contain the Cardinal. Imbuing the Witch’s Dust ensured there would be no sudden escape via teleportation. Even as the jaws of the trap closed, Eve grunted in pain as a thick humanoid beam of light attempted to punch through the silver cube. Allowing the dust to wipe the blood off her face Eve stared deeply into the trap manipulating the silver dust into tendrils to pierce and puncture.

The haboob died as Eve pulled more and more Witch’s Dust into the trap to both contain, and kill. It wasn’t a fair method of fighting, but fair fights were sucker games for the masses. Even as the storm died around her, Eve carved concentric runic symbols on all six sides of the newly created prison.

T’zon Zrel, the first of the dragons to notice anything wrong was also the first to fall. Silver rune-wire wrapped around the dragon before tightening in a flash of deadly tension. Moments later the scent of blood flooded the death trap as chunks of once-living dragon dropped to the ground.

In response the Cardinal called upon her deity to coat the remaining three bronze dragons in something akin to a superheated sun-skin effect. Eve’s eyes shook in disgust as she muttered, “What do you think happens when you turn the heat up in a closed box, moron?”

The newly created oven did seventy-five percent of the work!

Even though the dragons attempted to shift into elemental forms to ignore the heat it didn’t work. Sand and bronze both had melting temperatures. Within minutes two of the remaining three dragons were nothing more than a glass puddle and a metallic pile of goop. The final dragon turned on the Cardinal attempting to kill her in the hopes of escaping. A beam of pure laser light punched through his skull ending that possibility. Once the remaining dragon died Eve heated the box’s interior to impossible temperatures. Realizing her error, the Cardinal had converted herself into pure light elemental form. It was the only method she appeared to have to side-step death.

Eve ignored the trapped Cardinal to focus on the dragons being resurrected. Like the previous dragon she had killed for a massive Hoard, these four were able to bring themselves back from death’s grasp. Unfortunately, as a Witch, she had advanced quite a bit further in power. Countering such abilities was child’s play as Witch’s Dust gathered within the cube. It was mere moments until the amount gathered transmuted from dust into the appearance of quicksilver liquid. Without mercy, Eve allowed the silver liquid to eat the dragons deconstructing them once more into oblivion’s end. The dragons didn’t give up attempting to return and serve the Cardinal repeatedly. However, each time they resurrected, only the endless cycle of reincarnation awaited. Finally, the dragons died and didn’t return.

Eve’s eyes narrowed as the mana signature of the Rachel Morningstar had weakened considerably. The Cardinal had probably had something to do with the repeated resurrections of the dragons. Eve shrugged, the situation had been handled with customary bludgeoning. Even if the Cardinal wanted to complain to V’nor the deity wouldn’t interfere, now. As a bounty target of the System, there was only one end in sight.

Forming a second silver box, Eve began carving runes upon the surface as she enclosed the first box. There was no such thing as being too careful when dealing with the unknown in Eve’s mind. Her paranoia was at play as scenes from old anime flashed through her mind. The speed of light was nothing to sneeze in old Earth’s physics. With that in mind each new cube had a mirror shine surface, exactly like the first.

This might look easy, but it would be impossible upon first arriving. Eve thought as she continued building a silver cube version of a Matryoshka doll. Let’s see what she tries next.

Light burst forth from Rachel Morningstar’s elemental form showing exactly how her surname was granted. Eve struggled with the blazing form of the Cardinal’s transformation into the heart of a dying star pushed the limits of her ability to contain the woman. Thinking fast, Eve shifted the runes to allow heat to escape, but only heat. The surface of the sand around the silver cubes instantly melted into molten glass demonstrating the titanic forces at play. Witch’s Dust dealt with the heat by devouring the free energy feast to multiply in a constant stream of silver liquid.

With the additional influx of energy Eve duplicated the containment prison until a massive landmark covered in runic script was built. With the final layer of shielding, the heat dropped to negligible levels. Eve watched as the Cardinal’s final attempt to escape failed with apathetic eyes. Although there was potential value in keeping her alive, Eve had already chosen to tie up the loose end.

Ice started to form in the space between the last and second to last cube. As the ice grew, Eve tinkered until the heat from within the first silver cube fed the growth of new ice. With rapid speed the space between each cube gained an ever-increasing chill as she shifted the runes to enable the glacial predator. Due to the temperature at the core of the death trap, it was several minutes before the Cardinal realized her final moments had arrived. Ice eventually began to coat the interior of the first silver cube, relentlessly stealing the heat to feed the chilling dark.

Eve turned a deaf ear to the Cardinal’s pleas. Promises of powerful Classes, treasure, sexual favors, and curses resounded with increasingly desperate tones. As the final source of heat available within the silver cube-prison the ice reached out with hunger born from the void’s grasping maw. In a last desperate bid to stay alive, Rachel Morningstar shifted once more into a form of elemental light. However, the reflective property of ice perfectly countered the attempt. Instead of being immune to the ice, the Cardinal found herself being reflected endlessly as her humanoid form slowly disintegrated.

When the end was almost completed, Eve listened to the Cardinal recite a prayer asking V’nor to take her soul. It was with a bitter, almost betrayed look, that the dying woman realized her god wasn’t responding. Eve spoke into the cube providing an explanation for the bewildered enemy as a final act of mercy, “Don’t worry, as soon as I confirm your death I’ll remove my constructs. At that point, your deity will be able to see and collect you. Probably.”

With a last despairing scream Rachel Morningstar died in darkness.

Eve watched the System message confirming her bounty target’s death scroll past. It was an ironic twist that a servant of light died in complete darkness to her. She examined the corpse with her own senses confirming the kill. Once everything was satisfactory, it was the work of several hours to deconstruct the silver cubes before storing the material away in the Hut.

When the Cardinal’s corpse was finally revealed, Eve used Sacrifice for Power to eliminate any possible future problems. The soul mana attached to the Cardinal’s corpse was pulled into a rift that flashed with blazing brightness. Eve rolled her eyes at the clear display of annoyance from someone that couldn’t see her.

“Alright, I’ve handled the issue Wilson. Tell the light bulb he owes me one in the future.” Eve said waving away the System payment for the message.

If she hadn’t tried to keep it completely to herself, I have little doubt her deity would have intervened to save her. Eve thought as she turned back towards the dungeon city. Unfortunately, greed blinds just as effectively as the sun.

Spatial Step brought Eve back to the dungeon in short order. She took a brief moment to inform Rex that the Cardinal was no longer an issue. A few more steps brought her down to the dungeon’s 74th floor. In the small room reserved for her ‘instance’ of the Daedric Door, Eve smiled a sinister grin.

Floating up before the glowing fire-trapped Door, Eve shifted into her natural form before centering her mental state. It was possible the Daedric Doorway wouldn’t provide enough experience to reach Tier Seven, but that was fine. As long as the option to gain power outside the Deeps existed, Eve would take advantage of it. There were no factions here to block her progress, and no old monsters able to interfere with her plans.

Slow and steady wins the race. Eve thought as she closed her eyes to enter a mental discussion with her allies. Slow steady success carves the river into a Grand Canyon.