Accidental Reaver

Struggling to his feet, Luke barely noticed the soul barrier thinning behind him.

Limping to Aren's death site, he picked up Xera, who blabbered about this being her favorite fight yet.

"I can cut into damn souls with this ice trick of yours, Luke. Do you know how souls taste? I do. Better than blood, that's for sure." The sword wand's crystal shone bright blue.

Waving a hand, four glowing spheres entered Luke's Inventory. He administered emergency bandages all across his body, focusing on the parts directly attacked by the soul based beams. His health stabilized and, at a glance, comfortably sat at about thirty percent.

With the green flames now absent, Luke stood in complete darkness. After the battle, all that remained was a barren vault. A swirling white vortex materialized a foot away from him. Shelving the idea of using a return scroll, Luke ripped Xera out the flooring. He sheathed her, taking unsteady steps forward.

The soul barrier utterly vanished, and Luke heard footsteps rushing in.

A masculine elf voice yelled, "The three of you see anything? That maniac actually killed the boss alone."

The pale, almost sickly looking, elf woman slammed down the butt of her staff against the ground. A weak white light shone from the staff crystal, revealing Luke.

Not in fighting condition, Luke tried to bring out frost to crash his body into the white vortex two paces away. Failing that, he used Triple Step despite the pain warnings shooting all over his leg and brain. He flashed forward into the portal, with various hurried shouts coming after him.

"You're not getting away, thief."

"Don't!"

"We can negotiate, human hunter, escaping will lead to us chasing you down."

"My Basilisk will eat you by the bone once we find you. The city won't keep you safe."

Luke knew who that last one was, but he didn't care. Flashing a smile as his body faded into the white vortex, Luke gave them the bird.

He had to do it, since his trusty companion couldn't for him.

The Reaver landed in the victorian-like foyer room. The usual hunter groups waiting around were scant few.

With recent events, Luke deliberated over two paths. To stay here, in the 'public eye' of these hunters, or run off, back to Sylen he goes, tail between his legs. The second option never sat right with him. The hunter party he went and pissed off could damage his already precarious reputation at best.

There was also the matter that they could attack him. Luke welcomed the idea. The damage we suffered healed by the second, and he already pinpointed frost intermixing with essence. Elementalization came back, and Triple Step never reached its limit in the first place. In effect, Luke retained his techniques, item effects and artifacts. For the next seven minutes, the nuisance became the lockout on his six class abilities. Although the command over Elementalization reduced temporarily, likely from overdraw. Summoning ice to cover Xera would be as far as Luke could manage.

The thought got him to ruminate for a second, I need to scour around and pick up a decent passive skill. Something tells me going for the first two I can find would be a terrible idea in the long term. Using up one of the two remaining free slots can't be detrimental.

Dragging himself over to a ruined red-brown decaying wall, Luke leaned against it. Blood Haze and the natural regeneration within his body recovered the damage quite well. He already sat at over fifty percent health, his vitality inhuman after shattering the second threshold. The Dryad Bandages did their role well, cooling green mists working on his most grievous wounds.

Other hunter groups paid attention to the isolated Defier, discussing what could make him become such a wreck. Luke's reputation spread across the level thirty to fifty cohort of hunters, his clear ownership over the Blood Forge had created fans and enemies alike. Plenty still knew the name, but not his face, however.

Ice Defier Luke—or Wallace—became a known name, as did all Defiers. Putting that name to the young black haired man with a wiry frame was the challenge. With that caveat, plenty of other hunters pegged him as a lone wolf, in over his head. Not the monstrous genius breaking convention, Luke Wallace.

Steadying his breathing, Luke awaited the four pursuers, who dropped into the middle of the foyer.

The human Mage complained, "Can't believe we had to waste our Return Scroll like that, the damn portal was right there."

Rolling her eyes, the monic Astralist said, "We didn't kill the boss. It isn't like the lowest dungeon, only the party responsible for Soul Lord Aren's death can use the exit portal. We slouches are unattuned."

The sickly pale elf woman, a class Luke still didn't recognize, slowly pointed her staff in Luke's direction, "Take your grievance up with that one, Edgar."

Rather than Edgar, who Luke assumed was the Mage, the brawny elf with a Basilisk took the offer. He stormed over to Luke and grasped the Reaver by the hem.

"I don't know who you are, but you're going to cough up every drop Aren let a trickster like you have." The elf punched Luke in the right cheek, "Get to it."

The Reaver barely felt a thing. Hunters of this level simply didn't excite him anymore, and few had the attributes or power backing them to damage him much. The full fledged punch left a small bruise—nothing more—already worked upon by Blood Haze and natural regeneration.

"You're mistaken, my pea brained elf Warlord," Luke continued but was interrupted by another punch, the black haired elf fumed—already out of the realm of negotiation.

"I see you are not completely lacking in knowledge, human filth. Bring out the items, or I'll put you through much worse."

"It is you who needs to be worried about dealing with 'much worse.' Don't touch me again." Luke tried one last attempt at diplomacy, in some respects, he was in the wrong. In others, the party harassing him was. In that case, let it be a wash and go their separate ways. Luke made the decisions he did due to preconceived notions of the Tide's difficulty, and that he couldn't trust this elf worth shit.

Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

Disparate hunter parties idling around the foyer spoke in hushed whispers. Most still leaked out to Luke's senses, though.

"Is that Caleric? I wonder what got him to target Defier Luke. More importantly, what on Ludus put a Defier in that sorry state?" A crass human Warrior spouted, seeming to enjoy the conflict more than the rest of his party.

A yellow furred tora woman from another party spoke, "Hateful noble elves, Caleric is just another wealth born runt, angry at being stuck like the rest of us."

That comment seemed to reach Caleric's ears; red rose within his eyes, and he swung upon Luke with greater fervor. Reaching up much faster than Caleric could complete the swing, Luke clutched the fist into his hand, slowly exerting strength. The elf tried to push more strength, but couldn't budge. Then Luke stopped holding back.

The bones with Caleric's fist broke one by one, and the muscles around them became mush. Caleric tried to rip back in pain, but Luke kept it within his grip, turning it into processed handpaste. Only when fully satisfied did he let go, the elf made a motion to his Basilisk, and the creature pawed with its hind legs about to attack.

Sighing, Luke wrapped the same hand on over to the elf's neck, tightening hard enough for the elf to have his air supply cut off.

Glancing over to Caleric's three dumbfounded party members, Luke said, "I've had enough of your incompetent leader, get that Basilisk under control. Or you can have fun trying to heal a crushed neck before he dies to lack of oxygen."

The monic woman, quick on the uptake, put her body in front of the Basilisk, "Now Grether, attacking here is-"

The companion whipped his tail, a perfect chance for Luke, as his elf captive tried to use an ability to start an attack. He casually put Caleric before the tail attack, causing the elf to take quite the lashing. For good measure, Luke punched Caleric's stomach, causing it to cave in dramatically.

"Try something again, Caleric, I would love it. I slew Aren by myself, and if you're any measure of how capable your party is, you should thank me for it. You'd be sliced meat and soul sucked by now."

Both the sickly elf woman and human man approached Luke cautiously, "We just want to come to a resolution," the Mage began, putting a hand on Caleric's shoulder, "He's too used to getting things the way he wants through force alone, What do you say we take a step back, dignified hunter?"

From beside the man, the elf woman scrutinized Luke head to toe. She said, "How is it you are more in tune with the Netherworld than I, a Necromancer? The rot there, it fed you, that happens to very specific bloodlines or classes. Which are you?" As for the conflict over the boss and its valuables, the woman appeared not the least bit concerned. Nor did any worry reach her eyes over Caleric. Instead, that question overtook her attention.

Star-lit waves began to envelop Caleric's ruined hand. Luke pinpointed the source—the monic woman. He commanded, "Stop that. Our talk isn't over yet."

"What? That's madness. He needs healing after what you've inflicted upon him." By now, the monic had wrangled the Basilisk into a temperamental but tamed state.

"I barely roughed him up. I can 'inflict' much worse. Stop. I won't say it a third time."

Unexpectedly, the elf Necromancer sided with Luke, "Kamila, none of the wounds are fatal. See the fragile balance you threaten to break. I will do the talking from here, agreed?" She slowly gestured with her staff, deadened eyes meeting both the Mage and the Astralist.

The human Mage nodded slowly, "You've been the level-headed one, Sorene." He sent a sorry gaze to the strangulated Caleric, stepping back.

Keeping his piece, Luke motioned with his chin, "I'm not giving up the items Aren dropped. Your party can try again tomorrow. I'm done with this dungeon for the time being."

Staring back with a fish-eye like gaze, Sorene said, "You outwitted us, human. It was my error in judgment to become the aggressor when we encountered one another. Calderic is upset at the loss of opportunity, one I firmly still believe is too deadly for us to undertake. I count you as a blessing in disguise, my research on Soul Lord Aren indicates my party would've seen casualties at our current power."

"Viewing it that way, then why did you come along with them? Hunters usually avoid death challenges, its why the lot of you lack any progress in techniques."

The pale elf signed slowly, "Better to have tried beside my friends, no matter their stupidity," the woman tapped her staff head on Calderic's upper back, "than to let them go in as a party of three, sealing their deaths."

The Reaver resonated with that. He dropped Calderic to the floor, who began gasping for breath while groaning over the ruined hand. Luke became impressed by the burly guy's pain tolerance.

Feeling his legs were healed up enough, Luke exited the foyer silently. Snippets of conversation reached his ears as he left.

Calderic cursed between gasps, "Why did you let him off so easily, Sorene? The four of us could've killed him."

A thwack cracked across the waiting area, "You've always lacked insight, Calderic. If you looked at that hunter, you'd figure out who he is. This party couldn't kill the ninth Defier and live to see the morning. This is the last stupid mistake I'm going to fix for you, as of now, I'm leaving the Baleful Star's party."

The silver moon began to creep up into the sky. Its typical golden counterpart mysteriously missing.

Luke ceased to understand the astral phenomena of this world and stopped trying to. The winds were on the colder side, but his re-entry into Sylen proved simple enough. He strolled down the central roads, noticeably less congested than before. Sylen's thugs took a gander at him before immediately regretting the decision.

Unlike Sylen's hunters, Luke's face was well-known to the underworld. The bounty on his head was the primary factor in that—and—the fact trying to take it would lead to total eradication by the Defiers, each of the big three laid down orders that subordinate gangs were not to take action against the 'Ninth' until further notice. Any violators would receive no protection from them.

Chander Pyrite, the petulant man-child, had raised the bounty to an eye-watering ten thousand gold. The measure became a telltale sign that nobles were too removed from reality; gold was a pittance in return for the total eradication of your line.

Unrepentant moves like this led to a dark policy among the Defiers. Target one of their own, and not only did you die, so did any folk unfortunate enough to carry your bloodline, barring the young, that is. No one else would be spared. A harsh measure for a harsh world.

Like this, Luke toured southern Sylen with a peaceful cadence. He bathed in a nearby bathhouse, taking Xera inside despite policy. Who was going to tell him no? The gang secretly running the place? Coming out, he swapped his clothes for ordinary ones, yet well-fitted, with a black and purple trim theme. Similar to a suit, but not quite—more casual.

Of course, Xera stayed by his side, as did Wayfinder. Whispering Tome floated over his left shoulder. He knew better than to try and jam those three into the Inventory. He hadn't tried with Whispering Tome, but following the typical artifact policy, he left the non-verbal party member alone. Luke tried to meld in with the pedestrian traffic going toward the eastern quadrant—the aura around him prevented success. He tried to reign it in, reducing its signature considerably, like a predator trying to show its belly in peace—rabbits still hopped away, regardless.

It didn't help he produced no sounds with his movement, creating unease for those who noticed. Other hunters also remained wary, barring those in the second tier or above, which were far and few between. Sending Whispering Tome a glance, sound returned to his steps as he temporarily turned off the artifact passive—Ethereal. Soon, all but the faintest aura receded within him. The subconscious reaction of those around him became more suitable to viewing an equal, or someone of similar species.

In many ways, hunters who had ascended once or more weren't all that human, tora, elf, monic—what have you. This applied to a lesser degree to ascended non-combat classes as well, but the disparity remained a fraction in comparison.

Luke scanned the night sky, enjoying the serene image.

A normal night, for once. Clouds are gone, no rain, one moon, soft moonlight, and temperate weather. Peaceful.

He turned a street, the one the Defier's Guild resided upon. Right outside its entry gates, stood several hunters. They were unremarkable to Luke, except for one woman, a girl he'd almost forgotten to promise his time to tonight.

Lilly.