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I didn’t have time for the pain or the light show, however. My attention was captured wholly by the man in front of me.

I didn’t recognize him. Whoever he was, his face looked crazed. A grin stretched his lips in unnatural ways that almost made them crack. I could detect nothing but glee in his eyes. He was dressed in dirty leathers and held his sword loosely at his side. It was a casual stance, like something a complete beginner might show.

It was all the more surprising when he moved with a speed that almost matched my own.

I barely managed to put up my sword before the clash of steel on steel rang out inches away from my face. Still, I wasn’t in the best position to fight. I couldn’t get a proper breath in through my sliced-open throat. My poor footing, half-squatting as I was, made me stagger.

I landed on my back, and my oddly fast attacker was on me instantly. Then his inexperience in melee revealed itself. Instead of hamstringing my legs, he went for my face again. This allowed me to land a solid hit against his chest when he overextended.

Whatever hidden powers he might possess, the man wasn’t durable. The cracking of bones rang out as my inhuman strength launched him against the palisade. I couldn’t help but wince, despite the fact that his broken spine was my handiwork.

I tried to suck down more air, but just like my last few attempts, I only got a tiny bit of oxygen, along with plenty of blood gurgling down paths it wasn’t supposed to go. My flesh felt feverish. Mana was almost cooking it as it flowed through my body, working overtime to support the refinement.

Problem was, refinement didn’t translate directly into healing. While that could happen as a side effect, you needed truly immense amounts of mana to make it work. I was funneling as much mana as I could, but the amount I could control at any one time was still limited.

This wasn’t like the reckless draining of a mana crystal, when all the mana came gushing out in a tidal wave I could barely control, healing my ribs as a result…

I tried to sigh and gurgled instead.

I promised myself I wouldn’t do that again without a good cause.

Blood was still streaming from my throat. The lack of air was starting to make me lightheaded.

I didn’t have time to think up a better solution.

This certainly qualifies as a ’good cause,’ I thought grimly as I fumbled for my pack in search of a mana crystal. But before I could even cast my pack off my shoulders, a bizarre sight froze me in place.

The enemy I thought I had downed, the same man whose spine cracked when I threw him against the palisade, was twisting upright before my very eyes.

His movements were not natural. His limbs moved smoothly enough, but his torso was like something out of a horror movie. He thrust his arms up, gripped the edge of the palisade that had broken him, and heaved. His legs scrambled and finally found purchase, allowing him to lever himself upright. Still, the tilt of his upper body heavily favored his left side, and the step he took towards me made his entire torso jerk backwards. It almost destabilized him enough to make him fall again.

Almost, but not quite.

I abandoned my attempt to get at the mana crystals, scrambling to my feet as quickly as I could. Moving only made blood seep out of my wound more aggressively, and my face was slowly turning blue from lack of oxygen. Ignoring that, I managed to find my footing and took a defensive stance.

The man laughed. It was a horrible, gurgling sound that spoke of ruined lungs, a thought further reinforced when blood bubbled up between his own lips in response.

And yet, for a moment, I recognized his expression.

As unnatural as it looked on the man’s face, as painful as it must have been to stretch his facial muscles into those positions, I knew that smug smirk.

I had seen it on Mercutio’s face just a short time ago when he sent us charging into the city.

I gurgled angrily at the man. He responded with an equally gurgling laugh as he jerked forward, sword again aiming for my face.

He really wants to disfigure me. That was my brilliant thought as I briefly directed mana away from my healing, flashing it through my body just long enough to lunge forward with a blur. The man’s body was damaged enough now that I easily moved faster than him, and I took his arm off at the wrist.

He didn’t scream or show any sign of pain. He merely glanced down at his missing limb like its disappearance startled him. But by the time he looked up, I was already moving again. I swung my sword and sheared right through his stupid helmet-less head, and he dropped for what I hoped was the final time.

To my utter shock, my purse grew a bit heavier as a soul was added to it.

He was alive? Wait, then, was I seeing things? But…

My thoughts scattered as I stumbled, and I only barely supported myself against the balustrade without tipping over it.

I was losing more blood. I needed oxygen, pronto.

I had no way of remedying either situation.

I wondered… if I could raise my head and focus my blurry eyes, would I spot an asshole of a demon watching me from the front door of his turtle home?

I tried to do just that, even as I stubbornly continued spinning my mana towards my injury. But I could see nothing past the increasing haziness of my vision. Besides, the black dots swimming all around me were too distracting to allow further coherent thought.

I thought I heard shouting. I could have sworn someone grabbed me from behind as I collapsed.

Then everything went black.

—

I came to with a pained gasp and a heaving cough. I was drowning. The water was deep in my lungs, and it was now violently coming out. Heave after heave I puked it up, until there was nothing left to obstruct my airway and I could suck down blessedly fresh oxygen.

Someone was thumping my back. This triggered a whole secondary round of dry heaving, which must have shown them they could stop. The thumping ceased, and I finally collapsed onto my side.

I couldn’t see a thing. It was just darkness all around me, and everything felt woozy and unstable in a way I had only ever experienced while standing on a boat.

Then someone gripped my face, and they poured something down my throat. Whatever it was, it sent a stab of light and pain straight through my skull.

I tried to twitch away, but I felt more like a collection of limp noodles than a person. The light and pain spread down my throat and burned all throughout my chest. Oddly, they also faded at a steady clip, which was a tiny bit reassuring.

I heard someone curse, then call my name. When I refused to do anything but pant, they poured a second dose down my throat, causing another eruption of light and pain. This time, though, when the light slowly eased off, it took the darkness with it.

My vision was blurry, but I could see. Someone was gripping my face with both their hands, and I was staring directly into their eyes.

I knew those eyes.

"Mia?" I rasped, then broke into coughing. My entire respiratory system did not like it when I tried to talk.

"You absolute idiot," Mia hissed harshly, then shook my head to emphasize her words. "What were you thinking? You tore off, and we were ordered deeper into the city immediately, and then I catch sight of you dying on top of the bloody ramparts? You do realize that if I hadn’t rushed up here, you would be dead by now, right?"

I let out a wheezy laugh, which, ouch. Worse, it only made her shake me again.

"Trying to shake the stupid out of me won’t work," was my highly intelligent quip. Judging by the way her hands tightened on my head, she did not find it funny. Then again, my weak, reedy voice was hardly ideal for comedy.

She let out a frustrated breath, then shook her head as she stepped away from me. Losing the support of her hands almost made me sag back to the ground, but I rallied and kept myself in a sitting position.

"Whatever. Your stupidity is something we’ll worry about later. At least I owe you a little less now."

I frowned at her in confusion.

She explained, "I saved your life? Like you saved mine when you led me closer to Glaustro after the teleport? And then you used a healing potion on me, like I just used on you?"

I snorted, marveling at how that was already possible to do. "You know you don’t owe me for that, right? You tried to help me, and I didn’t exactly tell you to follow me. Besides, while you were badly hurt, you probably wouldn’t have died without that potion. But I definitely would have, just now, without your help."

She smiled at me. It was such a genuine smile that all I could do in response was blink dumbly. "Well, I disagree. Besides," she teased, her mood already recovering, "if it wasn’t for that moment, I wouldn’t have bought two healing potions before we left that city, just in case. So you really saved yourself."

"You are weird," I told her honestly. Then her smile started to dip, and I hastened to add, "But I like it! It’s… a good weird!"

I wanted to scoff at the relief that bloomed in my chest when her smile recovered. Almost getting killed was not the moment for deep emotional bonding.

Instead, I focused on dragging myself fully to my feet, then took an experimental step. It was a bit wobbly, but considering what I had just gone through, I felt amazing.

"What’s the situation like out there?" I asked, changing the subject.

Mia immediately sobered up. "There are no civilians. Like, at all. There were only soldiers in the city, and surprisingly few of them, at that. I think…" She trailed off, leaning over the parapet to look into the city. "Yep. The others have hunted them down already. They’re coming back out of the city."

We descended the stairs slowly, mostly for my sake, and then joined the crowd of people headed back towards Mercutio. I earned myself a few odd looks, but none of them really commented on all the blood covering the entire front of my armor. I grimaced and contemplated trying to wipe some of it off, but I knew it was hopeless.

It feels all sticky and gross, though, I thought, then snickered to myself. There I was, complaining about the way my shirt stuck to my torso instead of celebrating my survival.

The thought lifted my mood a little, at least until I laid eyes on Mercutio again.

The man stood on the lip of his turtle’s shell, impatiently tapping away with his foot. This, along with his pouting face and crossed arms, gave him the appearance of a belligerent young adult rather than a powerful demon.

"Finally!" he snapped. "I only felt a few human souls left in the city when we arrived. And still, it took you this long to return?" He gestured at his own feet. "You may place the souls there."

For a long moment, no one moved. Confusion reigned on every face.

Apparently, that was the wrong reaction.

"Well?!" Mercutio’s face contorted in anger. "What are you waiting for, you failures? Present all the souls you reaped from that forsaken city! I am an important surveyor sent here by the logistics division. I need to sift through the locals’ memories in search of clues to important locations and materials."

Again, no one moved.

Then some poor yet brave soul hesitantly piped up. "All of them?"

"Yes, all of them!" Mercutio shouted, his gray skin taking on a pale white hue in what must have been, for him, a flush. "You will obey me, now!"

His rage was rolling across us palpably at that point, but at least he didn’t kill the recruit who dared question him, no matter how much he looked like he wanted to.

I don’t know where I found the courage to speak up, but from the relief rippling out around me, I knew instantly that I was voicing the question on everyone’s minds.

"And how will we know which souls we earned now, and which we had from before? You can’t be asking us to give you everything we own. Some of my souls were a gift from a sergeant."

Well, one was, but he didn’t need to know that.

Mercutio’s eyes focused on me, and the sheer malice glowing there made me want to back off. I didn’t.

After a few tense moments of silence, the demon broke into a low chant. Mana spun up around his hands, resolving into runes, before it suddenly erupted. It washed over us and into the city. Then, like a line that had been cast out, the demon reeled the mana back in.

I shuddered as it passed over me again, but the moment it did, my purse lightened up. I cautiously opened it and reached in, feeling at once that some of the souls were now uncomfortably hot. I extracted them one by one until I held a number that matched up to my memories of the slaughter.

"Would that suffice to get you useless mortals moving?" the demon snarled.

This time, no one hesitated. One by one, we walked up and turned over the souls, no matter how reluctant we felt doing it.

He nodded, his voice dripping with disdain. "I thought so. You can set up camp here. We’re leaving at first light."

Turning away, he flounced towards the door of his home.

"But…" Mister Twenty Percent Ascension, completely covered in blood not his own, was the one who piped up this time. "Aren’t you going to claim the city?"

Mercutio stopped cold in the middle of his dramatic exit. Turning back with glacial slowness, he fixed his icy gaze on the poor recruit.

"Do I look, to you, like one of those soldier types? Do you think I belong to the conflict division?"

"N-No, sir," Mr. Twenty Percent stammered, snapping a salute just as, ironically, he would have done for a ’soldier type.’

"Then why are you asking me to do their job?!" Mercutio bellowed, sufficiently cowing a lot of the recruits into flinching away.

I just frowned. No claiming meant no demonic city, and no demonic city meant no invaluable resources. Including, in fact, the ability to teleport to other towns and contact higher-ups in the legion.

Very convenient, if you ask me. For Mercutio, that is. Was he even allowed to make us attack this city?

It was a very important question, and one I was unlikely to get an answer to. What I could do, however, was boost my chances of survival a little.

The fight had shown me that, no matter how powerful I became, a single moment of carelessness was all it took to kill me. More importantly, it showed me that my nominal allies did not give a shit. Did they really not see me getting attacked? And if they did, were they told to look away, paid to do it even, or were they just hoping to get my stuff once I died?

It didn’t matter. I had to get the other recruits on my side, and I was pretty sure I had the right approach in mind. It was an idea I had been toying with for some time, but had judged it to be not worth the effort.

After that little incident, though?

I needed to be able to turn my back on the other recruits without fear of getting shanked.

I cleared my throat.

"Before you all scatter, I would like to say a few things," I began, speaking loudly as the other recruits turned away to their own miniature camps. I found it reassuring that everyone nearby turned back towards me, though I wasn’t sure the whole troop heard.

"Spread the word, please. I need all of us here for this," I insisted.

Then I walked towards the middle of the congregation. Mia, bless her heart, followed in my footsteps. So did Mr. Twenty Percent and a couple others who wanted to stay close for whatever reason.

When I was deep in the ranks, I looked around me, took a deep breath, and spoke.

"We can’t afford to continue like this. We got lucky this time, but what if we encounter a city that’s not ruined next time around? Somewhere with defenses intact?"

It was unlikely, but they didn’t know that, and I certainly wouldn’t tell them. I liked the ripple of doubt my words caused, though.

"We need to be more united," I declared. "So, here’s my suggestion…"