Rayleigh’s vision shifted in and out of focus. Dark shades of red and blue intertwined with pink as she fought to hold on to consciousness. She had blacked out in training several times before, but never like this. Her inner voice told her it would be bad if she let herself slip back into the darkness. She didn’t know how she knew, but she was as sure as one could be that she had to fight with tooth and nail to hold on.

  A long, piercing scream echoed in her mind. It was a man’s voice, which reverberated like a dozen grinding gears in the emptiness. Her eyes saw only darkness. She felt tired. All she wanted to do was lie down and sleep—far away from everything. A tiny voice broke through—urging her to hold on. She was about to ignore it when she felt a hand on her shoulder and a familiar voice whispering in her ear. She couldn’t make out the words, but the tone was feminine, which puzzled her. Finding strength in the voice, she sluggishly clawed her way into reality, shoving the darkness away. She felt like she was fighting the ogre all over again, snuffing out every mote of pink and cutting every shade of black from her hollow world.

  Finally, her consciousness resurfaced—and she felt good for a split second as the trees and her companions came into focus—before pain wracked her body, radiating outward in waves originating in her back and face. She forced herself to not scream, but couldn’t suppress a soft whimper when the pain continued to build into a crescendo.

  In some small way, she was thankful there was pain at all because at least it meant she hadn’t broken her back and paralyzed herself. With agonizing slowness, she lifted a hand to her face, dreading what she would find there. Her fingers almost touched the pulsing gash of pain marring her features before she forced herself to stop and lower them back down. Her life was worth more than some scar or disfigurement.

  The sweet tang of metal coated her mouth, making her gag. She spat, the thick liquid disgusting and far too warm. At first, she thought it was her own blood until her sluggish brain made the connection; it was from the ogre. Nausea swelled until she retched, vomit and blood mingling and trickling down her chin.

  Finally clearheaded enough to focus on her surroundings, she saw short brown hair and brown eyes looking back at her. She was lying on the soft grassy ground and Purity was wrapping bandages around her left leg.

  “Hello” Purity said in her usual shorthanded manner.

  For a second, she wanted to scream at the smaller girl for her inane sense of normalcy, but the familiar stunted greeting calmed her rising fear. She tried to answer, but ended up coughing and gagging before finally getting the words out.

  “Purity… Wh… What happened?”

  “The monster exploded. You’re injured.” Purity looked back down toward Reyleigh’s half bandaged leg and then to her abdomen and finally to her face. To her credit, she didn’t look away in disgust or pity.

  Reyleigh followed the path of Purity’s gaze. Half dried blood caked every surface of her body, with bits of flesh and organs spattered everywhere. If she didn’t know better, she would have thought she had bathed in blood and bits of flesh—the monster explosion must have absolutely drenched her. Before she could comment on her state, the pain washed over her again, a shiver running up her spine despite her desperately desire to weather it. Slowly, she tried to get her legs under her, but they wouldn’t obey.

  “Shit. I can’t… I can’t stand up.”

  Ice laced her veins, and her fear mounted. She tried again to get her legs to cooperate, straining and whimpering, but hard as she tried—they just wouldn’t listen to her commands. Pain pulsed through the muscles of her thighs and calves, and even though she could feel them—oh gods, could she feel them—they were either too weak or too bruised to hold her weight. Instead, they flopped uselessly. She kept trying until she noticed Owen come running from behind a copse of bushes.

  Grime covered him too, not to the same extent as her, but enough to make him look like he was more undead than man. She dimly remembered hearing his scream when the ogre exploded. Blood and guts caked his armour in streaks, evidence of a feeble attempt to remove the worst of it. At least he looked better than her.

  “Reyleigh! Thank the Fallen… You’re awake.”

  He closed the last few meters and held her temples with both hands, careful not to touch her nose or cheeks.

  “I can’t believe you survived! We were ten meters away, and the blast threw us around like kittens. You flew for almost fifty meters! You should get a fucking medal or something—it was godsdamn glorious.”

  He was cracking his usual jokes, but his tone was sombre, the humour not fully reaching his eyes, which were constantly scanning her. If Owen was this tense, Reyleigh knew it had to be bad. She tried to smile to reassure him, but only felt the caked blood on her face crack and crumble.

  “Owen, where is Alistair? He—” she grit her teeth when the pain washed over her again “he should have been here. People die in the dungeon, not on the way to it. He should have saved us. Something must have happened to him!”

  Owen’s face contorted into a sneer, and it took him several tries before he answered.

  “I don’t know. I screamed myself hoarse trying to find him after I dragged you from the grass over there.” He pointed to a patch of grass with blood all over it. “But he hasn’t shown up. Fuck Reyleigh, I know you love the guy, but I think the heartless bastard left us out here…”

  Reyleigh grabbed Owen’s collar with surprising strength and looked into his wide eyes. “No. He wouldn’t do that! Something happened. I know it did!”

  Owen broke her grip and waved his harms in a placating gesture.

  “Ok Rey, ok. You saved our hide and I trust you. If you say something happened, then something happened.”

  “I’m sure. And Owen? Thanks…” she said.

  Letting her hand drop, Reyleigh hissed when she paid for her outburst with a fresh wave of pain. It warmed her heart to know Owen found her and helped her. She always felt like she could put her life in his hands, but now she knew.

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  “Don’t thank me. I only found you. It was Purity who dressed your wounds and helped me drag you over here.”

  Reyleigh looked from Owen to the reserved woman, now standing with her back to them, keeping watch. At the mention of her name, she turned her head slightly and nodded to Reyleigh with a slight smile in her eyes. Shakily nodding back, she realised she didn’t really know a lot about Purity. The fact that she knew how to treat wounds was both surprising and very welcome—even through the pain addled fog of Reyleigh’s mind, she could see that her bandages were expertly applied.

  “I don’t think I can walk. Can you or Harald carry me?” Reyleigh admitted to Owen.

  “Yeah, the big lug should be able to. He’s out looking for more monsters, but I think the explosion scared away all the beasts around here.”

  He looked at the forest like something was lurking inside the sickly underbrush waiting to eat him.

  “Anyway, we’re not in any condition to go back to the city. The dungeon’s only a few kilometres away if my guess is right, and Purity said she could feel something stirring inside her while she treated you. We think that maybe she’s getting some kind of wound treatment ability or spell. If we can get to the Dungeon Orb, maybe she can pick a Class that has an ability for healing or at least some first aid.”

  Reyleigh nodded, trying to fight her rising panic. She felt incredibly tired and decided to lay back down. Not long after, she heard Harald moving through the brush towards them. He had obviously been near enough to hear their conversation and came to pick her up.

  Reyleigh dreaded the coming journey. Her wounds throbbed painfully, feeling like hellish rends of fire across her face, leg and stomach. Her fingers rose unconsciously toward her face again before she could stop herself and her fingers came away soaked in blood. The touch made her notice the trickle of fluid that burned hot trails down her cheek before dripping down onto her bosom. It was hard to reconcile what her face might look like and her mind tried to defend itself by thinking of something else—anything to escape the pain. That’s when it hit her.

  “Where is Themis?”

  “Ah… Eh, well… He disappeared after the fight. My guess is he saved his own bacon and ran back towards Unbern. Fucking selfish prick…” Owen clenched his fist and looked back toward the city.

  Not sure if that’s a good or bad thing, she thought.

  Reyleigh wasn’t really sure what to make of the insufferable man’s disappearance. They needed all the help they could get to reach the dungeon, but she hadn’t really decided if Themis was a help or a hindrance. Even in the fight, his reckless actions had cost them just as much as they helped. Before she could come to any sort of conclusion, the pain struck her again and shattered her thoughts.

  Harald’s muscular arms snaked beneath her while she writhed, and he picked her up. All the while his deep voice vibrated against her body as tried to reassure her. He told her in soft tones that she was plenty light and that he could carry her for ages.

  While lying in his arms like a sack of potatoes, she blearily watched Owen and Purity stake a course and lead the way. She hoped they would reach the Dungeon Orb soon. Her limbs were on fire and felt sluggish, and her wounds throbbed. Even Harald’s steady arms couldn’t stop the wound on her face from cracking or her abdomen twisting painfully.

  The group walked in silence, mostly to not draw attention but also from exhaustion. They walked for what felt like ages, and after an hour or so, Reyleigh gained a little more clarity. She didn’t really notice a lot about her surroundings, but she was able to distract herself by reviewing what she knew about Dungeon Orbs.

  Most of her knowledge came from brief talks with Alistair, since the trainers and lecturers were famously tight lipped about the mystical artifacts. A long history accompanied the fabled Dungeon Orbs and—from what she had pieced together—they represented a lost part of the world itself.

  Before The Fall, the sentient races could all see their own level at any time, choose skills and classes as soon as they leveled and pick their skills freely—but all that changed after the Gods disappeared and the world shattered. Dungeons spawned, leaving them without divine guidance. Thankfully, they soon realised that outside all the newfound dungeons an orb made of mysterious crystal had spawned, which would let any thinking creature read its own status and choose their skills and classes, almost as if the orb was connecting them to the divine gift they had lost.

  Some people started worshipping the dungeons and protecting the stones, but were ultimately slaughtered when mindless monsters poured from the dungeon-entrances into the world. These were frenzied beings who attacked anyone and anything they could find. After a while, the dungeons and even the orbs—which people started calling Dungeon Orbs—were seen as a curse. The sentient races couldn’t resist the power of the divine gift however, and towns started springing up near the Dungeons to push back the escaping creatures and clear the way for those who dared to enter the depths themselves. This led to the rise of adventurers and later entire cities who fought the monsters to gain levels and powerful classes.

  It was one such Dungeon Orb they were desperately marching towards now, since a sentient being couldn’t attain a Class without touching one. Weirdly, one could gain General Skills without using a Dungeon Stone—a difficult feat, to be sure—but one Reyleigh remembered that she had managed right before the exploding ogre had thrown her away like a rag-doll. The memory served as a balm to the harrowing state of her body. Attaining a skill without a Class was certainly possible, but extremely difficult outside extraordinary circumstances—but with all her hard work, she had done it. All her hard training had paid off.

  Too bad I had to blow myself up in the process.

  She tried to laugh, but a fresh wave of pain made her groan and forced her back to reality; the Charge skill wasn’t much use with her body torn to shreds.

  “Harald. How bad is it?” Reyleigh looked up at her long-time friend, who met her eyes and looked away.

  “Not that bad, Rey. You’ll be fine when Purity gets her Class. I’m sure of it.”

  He was lying.

  She could feel her strength waning. The bleeding had finally stopped, but she was feeling fainter, and it was a struggle to fill her lungs with air. Something was wrong inside her. She could feel the blood talking to her, informing her that it didn’t look good. She froze.

  I can feel my… blood?

  No such thing had ever happened to her before. Excitement warred with trepidation as she closed her eyes and focused on the strange feeling, forcing the pain out of her mind to buy a few moments of clarity. It took her a couple of minutes, but she finally connected to something—like a new sense, but this one turned inward.

  Her blood was calling to her. At first it was faint, but then she could feel herself following the blood caking her body, flying along it until she reached the swollen gash running from her left eye, across her nose and mouth to her chin. Somehow, she felt the wound respond, and a warm feeling started radiating from where she was focusing.

  Doubling her efforts, she followed the blood further until her perception entered into her—the veins becoming clear in her mind, red blood flowing through them like a pipe ready to burst. The deep pounding of her heart reverberated like a drum, making her move in beat with the frantic tattoo. Starting with the cut on her face, expanding into a tree with a thousand branches, her perception flowed through her neck into her chest—

  “Rey. Hey Reyleigh! Don’t sweat it, ok? You’re gonna be fine. I promise.”

  The gentle giant snapped her out of her focused state and the vision—or whatever it was—disappeared.

  Sudden rage threated to overwhelm her, forcing a scream of pure agonizing desperation to her lips. She was about to let it rip out of her—the pain be damned—but the feeling faded.

  Reyleigh shivered. Something was messing with her feelings, and she wasn’t sure where it was coming from.

  “Ye… Yeah… I believe you Harald. I’m gonna be fine.” She said.

  Before she knew what was happening, her vision blurred, and exhaustion overtook her.

  Reyleigh relaxed back into the massive arms enveloping her body, feeling her consciousness slipping, slowly descending into a warm, fuzzy pool of nothingness. In a last-ditch effort to stay conscious she grasped at the sense she had just unlocked, the weird sensations of perceiving her blood and wounds, but she couldn’t seem to focus on it anymore, and soon she lost herself in the grasp of unconsciousness.