Elk stared as the Arahaktar crossed the line to the ravine.

  The water mage bathed them unintentionally, making Elk shiver with the memories.

  Zach walked slowly toward their leader, a male Elk knew very well.

  It was Titus’Rman, the male who had thrown him into hell. The one who had challenged Zach to the Mighty Duel. And Zach walked toward him as if he were just another enemy.

  Sometimes, Elk caught a glimpse of madness in Zach’s eyes. He wasn’t a bad person—by the Dragons, Zach was probably the best person of any race Elk had known in his short life.

  Zach was pure of heart, but just as he could be pure in his goodness, when he released the evil in him, that was pure too.

  At first, Elk thought it was the Bloodcraving—the same thing that afflicted every Arahaktar who dueled, just as Elk could see it in Titus' eyes as they slowly approached each other.

  What Zach had in his eyes was different, something Elk didn’t understand.

  What the other Arahaktar had in their eyes when they saw him—that he knew. It was a mixture of disgust and hate, as if Elk were the embodiment of blasphemy.

  They couldn’t kill Elk. That would be against the church’s traditions. But they could hurt him, just like they had since Elk turned twelve and his horns hadn’t grown yet. They had beaten him every single day of his life, and it only grew worse as he got older.

  The inevitability of his fate made his father stop talking to him, but he never looked at Elk like that. There was only pity in the big Arahaktar's eyes, but that hurt even more.

  His mother never stopped caring for him, crying as they bathed him in the holy waters of the Martyr’s River, pleading to the Dragons for his horns to grow before they threw him into Hell.

  The Dragons didn’t hear her prayers. What could they do? They were their gods—Elk was sure of it. Mighty, powerful, and protectors of the Arahaktar before the humans arrived… and they had returned to their work once the humans fled the planet.

  But they couldn’t make him grow horns. That was simply biology—one of the topics he had studied as much as possible before losing his freedom. Humans had studied the Arahaktar extensively, and their books were still scattered across different libraries, though only a few of his people gave them any importance.

  He simply didn’t have the right genes, as the humans called them. He was taller, though, compared to most Arahaktar. But the church didn’t care about the length of one’s legs or the shape of their hooves. They only cared about the horns—the connection between the Arahaktar and the Mighty Horned Creatures from the sky.

  Someone shook Elk, pulling him back to the present. It was Mary. She looked worried.

  “Are you all right?” she asked, her voice distant between the monkey screams and the memories making the air thick around his dazed face.

  Elk took another look at Zach, and even from a distance, he could see the young human smiling. He yearned for the fight ahead. Elk had never understood that feeling. Fighting had always been something he tried to avoid as much as possible.

  Now, he borrowed a little of Zach’s madness for himself.

  Elk stared at the approaching Arahaktar. He didn’t know them personally like he knew Titus, the church’s favorite warrior, but when he locked gazes with the enemy, all of them became Titus.

  “I’ve never been better.” Elk smiled at Mary, who looked puzzled. “Would you mind helping me kill those fucking bastards?”

  She glanced at the six approaching Arahaktar and shrugged.

  “All right, let’s do it,” she finally said as she prepared a fireball at the tip of her staff.

  They couldn’t kill him, but there was nothing written about him not being able to kill them. And if there was something like that in any of the holy books…

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  Elk didn’t care. Not anymore.

  A giant sword slowly manifested in the hands of the towering Arahaktar.

  He kept his steps steady and slow as he approached me. I didn’t summon my weapons. He probably knew who I was because of my titles and the show, but he didn’t know about my new weapon, how my powers worked, or how fast I could summon my weapons.

  “Are you stupid? Where are your weapons? You need to choose them,” he hissed. He clearly took the duel tradition very seriously.

  “I chose them already,” I replied nonchalantly as he halted.

  The world had faded around us. I could see my friends and allies fighting the other Arahaktar, but a circle had formed around us. I wasn’t sure if the system had created it or if it was just my perception being heightened by the adrenaline.

  I smiled, and that infuriated the Arahaktar.

  He dashed toward me with a higher speed stat than I expected. My plan was to assess my opponent and reveal as little as possible about my own abilities.

  I activated the invisibility skill and felt it working. As far as the system was concerned, I wasn’t in combat yet. That meant two things: I could strike the bastard from a surprise position, and my new dagger’s passive had reset. I had only my normal stats and the upgrade for saving Elk’s life still active.

  The Arahaktar stopped his pursuit midway, no longer knowing where I was. My stealth hid me, making me disappear both to his eyes and ears. I took advantage of it and rushed toward him, fast and light on my feet, covering the distance as quickly as possible without him realizing it.

  When I was close enough, I summoned my blade and struck toward the giant’s stomach, knowing a wound there would make the fight easier.

  I met resistance—he had high constitution. His skin gave way under my 20% stealth-attack damage boost, and the blade sank in. I shifted my grip midway, pulling back to rip through his flesh and organs, but before I could finish the motion, he grabbed me by the neck and tossed me away.

  I rolled on the ground, stopping and looking at him. I could feel my Strength increasing. It wasn’t something physical—it was more like a drive to keep fighting, growing with each point.

  The Arahaktar pressed one hand against his wound and looked at me, disgusted.

  “Coward, using cheap tricks to defile an honored tradition,” he hissed, summoning a different blade now—a short sword. It suited him better, considering his wounded left side.

  I shrugged, knowing that would put him on edge. This Arahaktar was the biggest and strongest I’d ever seen, but he also had the worst temper. Normally, I didn’t use that against opponents since it could fuel them, but this one was clearly the type to let his guard down when angered.

  He disappeared from my sight.

  What? Can he go invisible too? I thought, but then I heard the air crackling right beside me.

  My instincts acted before I did—I activated a lightning momentum at the point of my feet, making me slide away just in time. The Arahaktar reappeared where I’d been standing a second ago.

  He had just blinked across the battlefield. That was a whole different type of skill.

  Now, he was the one smiling.

  I assessed the situation. That had to be a mana-cost skill, meaning he couldn’t use it too many times. There was no way it was repeatable more than two, maybe three times.

  He vanished, and the air crackled like thunder where he reappeared—I could predict that. But if he used it mid-fight, reacting in time would be much harder.

  The poison effect could be useful here, I thought as we locked eyes, each measuring the other’s next move.

  My first dagger strike was both light and shadow—it entered with the sharp end and exited with the serrated one. But my notifications showed both effects were ineffective.

  Still, if I kept going, he’d end up stunned or poisoned eventually. And with my Strength increasing, I’d be able to kill him sooner or later. I just had to survive long enough for my stats to grow and make sure he didn’t catch me off guard.

  I summoned my wand, and the lightning bolt shot forward, striking the monster’s bare chest. The 50% critical strike bonus after using abilities from two different classes—my first acquired skill—was still proving effective to this day.

  I used that small window to dash toward him, throwing my dagger at his chest, aiming for the heart. No matter how high his Constitution was, a dagger to the heart would still kill him.

  He snapped out of the shock earlier than my dagger reached him. I knew he’d be able to deflect it with his hand or blade, so I summoned it back and used [Lightning Momentum] to close the distance as fast as possible.

  If he stayed in place, he had no way to escape the attack. I’d force him to use his blink defensively and gain an edge. At least, that was my plan before the world exploded around me.

  The Arahaktar slammed the ground with his left hand just as I got close. All my hopes of piercing his flesh and stunning him with my lightning aura vanished as a burst of fire sent me flying.

  The explosion's radius was strong enough to knock me back, slamming me into an unscathed tree at the forest’s edge—the very place we needed to run toward.

  My vision went black from the impact.

  The air crackled beside me.

  The next thing I saw was his sword descending toward my left arm.

  The monster pinned me to the ground with his blade, the steel piercing straight through my hand. No +10 in Constitution was going to turn my skin to steel against this bastard.

  The searing pain and shock sharpened my senses, and I finally saw the demon towering over me.

  “You’ll go down like the vermin humans are,” he hissed, raising his hoof—then brought it down toward my face.