by CJ Embers
When it came into view, my eyes widened. This Phase was pretty normal in terms of the enemy itself, but this time there were half a dozen of them instead of just one. They all appeared to be human and held a variety of weapons.
Because they hadn’t seen me amidst the trees yet, I took a moment to look over the situation. Each one held a different weapon. Sword, spear, a bow, battleax, throwing knives, and a spiked club.
This Phase was clearly testing my ability to fight against more than one enemy. Common sense told me I wouldn’t be able to take on all six at once. The most that I could probably take on at once was two, but considering their weapons, even that was risky.
I sheathed my sword, pulled the bow from my back, and took an arrow from the quiver. The long-range weapon had barely seen any use during the previous Phases, but I had a feeling it would be quite useful during this one. Because hand-to-hand combat against the adversaries would be risky due to the number of them, picking them off with something from afar would be my best bet.
I nocked the arrow and cautiously stepped out from behind the tree again. Lifting the bow, I took aim, making sure to lead on as the one in my sights paced around the clearing. I took a deep breath, fighting to keep my arms steady; my bad shoulder was causing a lot of weakness on that side.
Letting out a breath, I loosened my fingers. The bow string snapped back in place with a twang, shooting the arrow through the air. It landed right on the mark, right in the exposed neck of the other archer.
He cried out in pain and shock as blood seeped from the wound. Two of the others rushed towards him while the remaining three immediately looked in my direction.
I pulled another arrow from my quiver as I ran. My first shot hadn’t immediately killed the man, but there was no way he could survive it. The moment the arrow would be pulled from his neck, blood would pour from the wound and he would bleed to death. On the other hand, in a real-world scenario, leaving the arrow in was not an option either.
Maybe he will break it and leave the tip embedded in his neck until one of us kills the other…
It was unlikely he would not only be able to do that but also be able to fight in that condition, but I had to keep my mind open to the possibility regardless. Until I knew for sure, I had to assume he was still capable of fighting.
Behind me, I could hear the footsteps of the three pursuing me. I needed to think fast if I were to outsmart and defeat them. After jogging for a couple more minutes, I realized I hadn’t heard them following for a while.
I slowed, fingers still on the bowstring. The silence was worrying. Letting out a breath, I moved forward again. A man leapt out of the bushes in front of me, and I nearly froze. Instinct kicked in and I quickly raised the bow, but he cut it away with his sword before I could take aim.
The man swung his weapon at me and I rolled out of the way as it struck the moss-covered marble beneath me. He attacked again, and I dodged one more time, following up by going for his leg.
He tumbled to the ground and I struck his head to daze him. The man fought well through the hit and lashed out at me with his fist. I blocked with my hand and reached for an arrow. As I raised it above his head, ready to sink the tip into his forehead, something sunk into my back with an excruciating bite.
A gasp of pain escaped my lips and I faltered, nearly dropping the arrow. Another weapon sunk into my back, closer to my neck this time, and I slumped over the man beneath me.
The man tried pushing me off him, but my dead weight was too much for his tired muscles after our scuffle. Footsteps rushed forward. When they stopped beside me and the new enemy grasped my shoulder to pull me up, I shot my hand towards the newcomer.
The arrow still grasped in my hand sunk into his leg just above his ankle. He howled and let go of my shoulder. The man under me grabbed my throat and managed to pull me off him as the other one yanked the arrow from his leg.
As I hit the ground and the man grasped his sword, I knew I needed to get away now. They had both recovered and it would be incredibly difficult to fight them both off with throwing knives still stuck in my back.
Slashing my nails across his face awarded me with just enough recoil to shove his hand off my throat. Before the other man could get to me and join in on the attack, I bounded to my feet and shot off into the foliage.
As I ran, I reached behind me and grasped the handle of one of the blades lodged in my flesh. Not giving myself time to think about the pain, I immediately pulled it out. Sharp fire lanced across my body and I bit my cheek to stop a whimper from escaping my lips. I would bleed more by removing them, but there was no way I was going to go the rest of the Trial with two knives in my back.
I wiped the blood from the blade on my thigh and stuck the weapon in the quiver. After removing and stowing the remaining blade, battle tactics shuffled through my head.
My first attempt with fighting the enemies of the fifth Phase had gone quite poorly. Although I had injured both of them, it hadn’t been enough to slow either of them down.
Taking them out at long-range still seemed like my best bet, but I was now without my bow. I had the two throwing knives, but I didn’t have any practice in using that type of weapon.
Would it be much different than a spear?
The idea fell flat immediately. Throwing knives were too different from spears for me to be confident enough in my ability to use them.
I decided to circle back for my bow and retrieved the two blades from the quiver as I snuck through the trees. If I met my two pursuers on the way there, I wanted to be ready.
My back still stung fiercely from the knives, and the pain grated against my bones with every thud of my feet against the ground. My shirt stuck uncomfortably to the raw wounds, and I hoped the bleeding would stop on its own; becoming weak or fainting from blood loss before finishing the Trial would be spell doom for my chance of winning.
When I saw a flash of something through the trees, I silently skidded to a halt and dashed behind a tree. Despite the need to catch my breath, I forced myself to breathe shallowly to listen for the adversaries.
After hearing nothing for a solid ten seconds, I peered around the trunk. I could see nothing, which made me paranoid. Based on my first encounter with the fifth Phase’s enemies, they were skilled in ambushing; the first time around, it had been silent, just like it was now as well.
I quickly weighed my two options. Either I wait here a bit longer and potentially be ambushed, or I continue on and potentially be ambushed.
Knowing there was no good option, I silently groaned and moved on; at the very least, continuing would get me closer to my bow.
The back of my neck prickled as I stalked through the copse. It felt like eyes were on me, boring into my skin as the enemy poised to strike.
To my relief, I got to the area where my bow was without encountering any of the men. But despite being so close, I held back. There was a possibility that some of the men were laying in wait for me to return for my weapon.
Carefully sweeping my gaze around the area, I eventually spotted one enemy; he was camouflaged well. It was unlikely that just one was waiting to ambush me, so I continued looking around, praying none of them would see me. If I could see them, they could surely see me as well.
Another man was lying in wait, this time a short distance up a tree. The light from the arena glinted off something in his hands, and I realized it was throwing knives.
Realizing it was the same guy as before, I glanced at the other. Knowing before attacking if he was the same as well would be beneficial, as then I would know which weapons he had.
After a few more moments of studying, I still couldn’t tell. He was too hidden. Not seeing any others, I pulled back behind the tree again and considered my options.
I would have preferred to deal with the one in the tree first, but because I wasn’t well-versed in throwing knives, I would kill the one on the ground first and hope I would be able to take him out quickly and silently.
As
I snuck around the area to get behind him, I prayed that I didn’t stick out like a sore thumb; my clothes weren’t exactly geared to go unnoticed with.
Barely daring to breathe, I slowly got closer to the man, gripping one of the knives tightly in my hand. From here, I could see that it was the swordsman. When I was directly behind him, my thundering heartbeat made me paranoid the enemy would be able to hear it.
I reached forward, my hands trembling from the fear of being caught. Steeling myself, I shot them forward, slapped one over his mouth, and pressed the blade to his throat with the other, immediately digging it in and drawing it across his skin.
The man had no time to defend himself and I kept my hand over his mouth as he fought to breathe through the blood choking him. When he began flailing, I swung on top of him and kept him held down, not wanting any possible noise to alert the other man and any others who were possibly here.
The only noise now was the blood bubbling through the gash in his neck, and it quieted soon enough as the light in the man’s eyes diminished. A moment later, his body and sword faded away.
My hand and blade were coated in crimson, and I wiped them on a patch of moss beside me before shifting around to look at where the other man was perching. To my relief, he was still there, appearing none the wiser at what had just transpired.
After a quick glance around to see if I could spot any more men now that I was at a different angle, I quietly went for the remaining enemy.
I wasn’t sure how I would deal with him with him being up in a tree. Trying to silently climb up, pull him from the branch, and fight him on the ground was an option, but how likely was it that I could climb quietly? The trunk didn’t have many hand or footholds, there was a big possibility that my feet would slip on the way up and scrape against the rough bark, and my shoulder and back wounds would make such movement excruciating— if not impossible.
The only other option was to try my hand at using one of the throwing knives I had, and that didn’t seem much more possible than the first one.
When I was directly below him, I once again weighed my options. Both seemed to be equally undesirable at first, but when I thought more about it, I decided to try pulling him down. The way I figured it, if the knife missed, he would still be up there, and without another way for me to deal with him.
However, I couldn’t necessarily fail at removing him from the tree; by the time he would notice me, I would most likely be close enough to grab him anyway.
Just gotta fight through the pain. Use my right arm more than my left…
With my mind made up, I stowed my knife in my quiver and took a few steps back from the tree the man was perching in. As quietly as possible, I dashed forward and leapt as high as I could, grasping onto a handhold.
Pushing off with my legs, I reached for another. The man certainly heard me, but as I had hoped, I managed to reach him before he could react. With one last bound upward, I grabbed him. My weight brought him tumbling down, and I landed on the mossy marble as he crashed to the ground.
The impact left him dazed and he tried fumbling around for his weapons, to no avail. Retrieving mine from my quiver as I leapt over to him, I knelt on his chest, pulled his chin away from his neck, and sliced the blade across his flesh.
Just like with the other man, I smothered the noise he made, and only when his body stilled did I let off. As he faded from sight, so did the knife in my hand. Checking my quiver, I felt that the one in there was gone, too. Although it was frustrating, there was nothing I could do about it; clearly, the only weapons I was allowed to have throughout the Trial were the ones I had chosen near the entrance.
Once again, I glanced around the area to look for more men. Not seeing any, I ran from my cover, going straight for my weapon. After grabbing it, I whipped an arrow from the quiver, nocked it, and raised the bow.
I swung around, eyes sweeping the area. When no one jumped out at me and no weapons were flung in my direction, I relaxed somewhat. Not wanting to stick around, I darted back into the cover of the trees, bow still drawn. With a snap, my weapon cracked and the string loosened. Shocked, I inspected it. Running my fingers over the broken ends, I figured it had gotten damaged from being swiped away by the swordsman, and me drawing it had put too much pressure on the damage point.
Frustrated that I was now only left with the sword, I threw the bow down. I contemplated losing weight by chucking the quiver, too, but decided to keep it for now.
I thought back to the weapons I had seen at the start of the Phase. So far I had killed the one with the sword and the one with throwing knives. That for sure left spear, battleax, the spiked club, and possibly left the man with the bow as well.
The one I was most concerned about was the archer. His weapon was why I had chosen to go after him first with my own bow. Spotting a bowman would be hard enough; spotting arrows flying through the air would be even harder. At least the other weapons would be up in my face and always visible.
My best bet at seeing the remaining enemies was to get closer to the center of the arena. There, I would have a good view of the pool and stalagmite sections.
When I got there, I huddled down in a cluster of thick foliage. Because I was positive this Phase was testing my ability to fight against multiple enemies, I was almost certain I would find the remaining men travelling together. Breaking up would defeat the purpose of this Phase; I was lucky I had managed to get two separate from their pack.
So far, I couldn’t see anything in the sections across from me, and my skin prickled at the thought of the men sneaking up behind me and catching me off guard.
I was just about to leave to check out the house section when I thought I saw movement amidst the stalagmites. My gaze fixated on the section and I waited.
Another flicker of movement, this time a bit farther to the left. After seeing movement one more time, once again farther left, I came to the conclusion that they had searched the stone trees and were now making their way to the pool section.
I silently wondered if there was some way I could use the pool to my advantage, but nothing stood out. With no good ideas, I figured my best bet would be to ambush them, so I took off. Even though I was quite sure the remaining adversaries would be travelling together, I still kept my ears and eyes peeled.
As I passed the pile of burned wood that was once the house, I glanced over. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, I didn’t slow. At the edge of the copse, I stopped and peered through the bushes.
The men were just coming out of the stalagmites. Because the pool section was so open, I was able to see clearly that there were in fact only three of them left. While it was still possible the archer was still alive and was scouting the place alone, I doubted it; I would still be cautious though, just in case.
The enemies were using the piles of rubble created from the meteors to their advantage by moving from pile to pile, trying as best as they could to stay out of the open.
Wanting to ensure I would be able to get to them in time, I darted out from the trees and into the pool section. Following their lead, I used the rubble to my advantage. Every time, before moving to the next pile, I would sneak a peek around the area to not only make sure they couldn’t see me, but to also ensure I was going in the right direction to intercept them.
About a minute later, I was in position. The next move would be my attack. My heart was racing. If I mucked this up, I would most likely be dead. Never to see Karua again, never to see Helis again.
Chapter 25
T he three men were gearing up to dash to the next area of cover, and I unsheathed my sword and braced myself. Just as they moved, so did I. Running for them, I leapt at the man at the back of the line. Barreling into him, I thrust my sword into his side.
The noise immediately caught the attention of the other two, and they skidded to a halt. I continued the offensive immediately, lashing out at the closest man. He just barely managed to block with his spear. My sword sank into the wood and I struggled to ya
nk it back out.
The enemy with the battleax swung at me, and I ducked, pulling the spearman with me as I dodged. With another great heave, I finally managed to pull the weapon from the spear, just in time to block another swing from the axeman.
The hefty weapon caused a bone-jarring shudder to reverberate through my body as it struck my sword. The spearman joined in, and I fought to keep them both at bay. Sweat slicked my skin and burned my eyes as beads rolled down my forehead.
I needed another advantage, and I needed one fast. With everything I had been through so far, my body was tiring quickly, much more quickly than I desired.
Having a wild idea, I grasped the bundle of arrows and pulled them from the quiver as I dodged a thrust from the spear. I threw the arrows directly at the face of the man wielding the battleax.
Thankfully, it worked as I had hoped. The rain of arrows caught him by surprise and he paused in his attack. It distracted the spearman as well, just for a moment. Before they could both gather their bearings, I lunged forward and shoved the tip of my sword through a small space between the former’s armour pieces.
Pulling the weapon back out, the metal followed by a stream of crimson, I blocked a jab of the other man’s spear. We sparred for a while, as I had to be mindful of his weapon’s reach.
When I cut him down, I was only a little bit worse for wear with a slice in my side. The light faded from his eyes, and his body and weapon disintegrated just like the others had. I stayed still, not daring to move until the telltale light flashed at the center of the arena.
Ten seconds passed, then fifteen, then twenty, and I began to question whether I had missed it. As the adrenaline of the fifth Phase began wearing off, I grimaced at the pulses of pain shooting through my shoulder and back.
Despite the pool section having the rubble for cover, it was still far too open for comfort, so I quickly ran for the stalagmites before quietly sneaking towards the center. To my confusion, it was empty.
My skin prickled. Had the second last enemy arrived and I hadn’t noticed? Were they currently creeping around looking for me? I glanced behind me, nearly about to jump out of my skin, but there was nothing there but the arena.