The blades that nearly took his arm off belonged to a hooded figure that moved at a speed far surpassing Regis’ previous enemies. He barely jumped back on his feet before a set of stabs and slashes pushed him backward. Despite being able to deflect most of the attacks with his staff, both his reinforced armguards and his gambeson got covered in scratches and shallow cuts in seconds.

“Regis!” Amanda yelled as she noticed that the young elf was in trouble.

“Get the others out of here!” The youth roared as he tried to cast windblast with a few arcane words.

“We can’t just leave him here!” Sophie tried to reason with the others, but the 9th guard troops had its hands full with the large number of undead that was lured over by the frantic screaming of the noble youth.

“He can take care of himself,” Grego said. “We have to pull back or we won’t be able to hold out with this many fallen at our heels. Everyone, fall back to the gates! Protect the lord’s son!”

“Yes, sir!” The guards replied in unison as they started to back away.

“We can’t…” Sophie spoke up again before the giantess of a blacksmith threw the elven girl over her shoulder.

“You’ve heard the guy,” She growled in anger. “Regis can take care of himself and these assholes won’t stick around anyway. If we stay, we’re as good as dead.”

Their group turned around and ran back towards the distant gates, dozens of undead right behind them. Regis on the other hand only had to deal with the one corpse that tried to kill him. His opponent was relentless and the pair of faint flames that stared back at him from beneath the cloak’s hood didn’t help calm his thoughts either. The fallen was too fast for him to strike anything more than a glancing hit from time to time, while he was already bleeding from half a dozen shallow cuts.

‘I need to stop this fucker from jumping around like a tick.’ He thought as it avoided his arcana shot spell. After narrowly dodging a slash attack that left a far too deep cut on his bladestaff, the young dark elf desperately tried to push back his opponent. As he looked at the damaged blade at the end of his staff, he caught a look at the milky yellow crystal bound by the bronze infused roots. A horrendous idea came into his mind.

Regis stabbed towards the abomination’s head and as it moved its weapon to deflect it, the youth pushed his arcana into the sunstone with a single thought. ‘Glow!’ The word ran through his mind and the yellow crystal burst out with a blinding light that not only stunned the creature, but also made it fume with dark smoke. With his own eyes squinted, Regis stepped to the side as he pulled back the bladestaff half-way before using a heavy strike to part his stunned enemy’s head from its neck. He was elated for a moment by his victory before looking downwards as pain ran through his left side.

Even as his opponent’s body fell forward with its head going the other way, the bastard still managed to use some kind special skill to slash through his armour in the last moment. A long slash mark ran along his gambeson that hurt like hell and bled just as much. He pushed one of his hands on his wound while the other one stabbed the bladestaff towards the still burning gaze of his opponent’s severed head.

{You have exploited your enemy’s weakness and succeeded in avoiding a fatal strike while killing it. You’ve earned the ‘He who laughs last’ feat. Your deftness and luck attributes permanently increased by 1.}

The glowing words filled his blurred vision as the flames vanished from his opponent’s eyes. His side however still bled without showing any sign of stopping, the short sword’s edge still stuck in his flesh. Half of the blade’s width disappeared in his armoured side, making the wound almost an inch deep. With barely any arcana left, he cast lesser healing on the wound, closing it as much as he could around the blade to staunch the bleeding.

When the outflow of the blood lessened to an acceptable trickle, pushed some cloth rags on it to slow it further while gathering his arcana through laboured meditative breathing. As some of his strength and magic returned, he grabbed the blade that was stuck in his half-healed flesh and yanked it out with a firm move. An unearthly scream left his throat as the pain pushed him to the edge of fainting, but he still held on long enough to cast his healing spell on the half-opened cut.

After several dazed moments that felt like an eternity, the teary eyed youth pulled his hands back from his side that now sported a deep if scabbed wound. Golden words floated through his vision once more as he fell back on his knees.

{You have pushed through your pain and weakness to preserve your life. You have gained the ‘Resilient’ feat. Your willpower got permanently increased by 1.}

Regis was still kneeling on the ground, wheezing and cursing, as he rummaged through his satchel with careful moves to fish out the small clay bottle from it. He uncorked it and chugged down its content with ragged breaths, knowing that it would further heal him by five points through the next one minute. With the wound mostly sealed and him able to move again without fainting, he looked around for enemies. There were none. Whether by fate or some other reason, nothing moved around him in the dark. After making sure that it was relatively safe, he sat down to meditate for a minute or two before he crawled closer to his enemy to check out its stats.

{Fallen Blade dancer}

{Level: 7}

{Attributes}

Allure: 6 Deftness: 12 Erudition: 8 Luck: 7 Might: 8 Mind: 6 Physique: 10 Spirit: 7 Willpower: 9

{This bladedancer of unknown origins had likely to have belonged to an assassination unit. After its demise, it was brought back from the dead through the power of foul magic. Its original attributes had been halved by becoming an undead. It retained some of its capability of using its ingrained special skills and items.}

“Fuck me sideways!” He wheezed as he looked at his fallen enemy’s stats.

The bastard’s deftness was close to his own, even though it was halved due to being an undead. Regis started sweating bullets as he imagined just how fast and deadly the guy could have been when he was still alive. He raised his damaged staff above the corpse to take a better look at its armour using the faint light from his weapon’s cracked sunstone.

The blade dancer's gear was different from the standard leather armours he had seen so far. The upper part of the chest piece was made from hardened leather that covered the chest from the neck and down to about two centimetres beneath the ribs. The part below that was also made from leather, but it was crafted with two finger wide straps of leather woven across one another to create a protective mesh. It had the pauldrons and the tasset connected to it with brass buckles, both covered in leather scales.

What made Regis furious was that the armour had barely any damage on it. The only noticeable injury on the corpse beside the missing head was a hole beneath the rib section where one of the leather strips had a dagger sized hole in it with a piece of the murderous blade still sticking out. ‘I couldn’t even scratch the bastard.’ The young dark elf thought disheartened as he searched the corpse. Sadly, beside the neat looking armour and a now black blood covered cape, it had little of value on it. Its boots were simple leather pieces, along with his leg armours and armguards.

Most of the ordinary armour pieces looked weaker than Regis’ bronze reinforced gear. His enemy did have a neat square shaped belt pouch though. It looked like the phone holders some men would use to carry back home. It only had a couple bonze coins and a small bundle of herbs inside that were already rotting. Its weapons were a pair of bronze short swords that looked near identical. After the youth stripped the corpse of its belongings, he tried to identify the useful ones.

{Dusk-blade leather breastplate (scratched)}

{Item rarity: ??}

{Item quality: ordinary}

{Durability: 94/100}

{Armour type: medium}

{Armour Value: ??}

{Dusk-blade leather pauldrons (scratched)}

{Item rarity: ??}

{Item quality: ordinary}

{Durability: 98/100}

{Armor type: medium}

{Armor Value: ??}

{Dusk-blade leather tasset (scratched)}

{Item rarity: ??}

{Item quality: ordinary}

{Durability: 97/100}

{Armor type: medium}

{Armor value:??}

{Darkened woollen cloak (scratched)}

{Item rarity: common}

{Item quality: ordinary}

{Durability: 96/100}

{Armor type: medium}

{Armor value: 9/10}

{Bronze short sword (scratched)}

{Item rarity: common}

{Item quality: ordinary}

{Lesser enchantments: 2}

{Durability: 97/110}

{Damage: 20)}

{Square leather pouch(scratched)}

{Item rarity: common}

{Item quality: ordinary}

{Durability: 87/100}

{A square shaped hard leather pouch with small inner space to store items in. It is meant to be worn on a belt.}

“Don’t worry; I’ll take good care of these for you.” Regis promised absentmindedly as he stripped off the named armour pieces.

He tied the ‘Dusk-blade’ set together with the weapons and folded the cloak around it before heading towards the nobleman’s corpse. Regis felt a chill running down his spine as he saw dozens of black and white outlines at the edge of his vision, but the fallen seemed to have forgotten about him. Not a single one of them came closer than twelve meters and they’ve ignored the silent figure that sneaked around in the unnatural darkness. Not knowing whether to be grateful or worried, he crawled closer to the noble youth’s corpse to pull off the undead soldier that covered the magic crystal.

{Runebound spell weaver’s Inheritance}

{Item rarity: uncommon}

{Unique Legacy Crystal}

{Most wizards follow the simple yet rigid path of chant based magic. Runebound spell weavers refuse to strike deals with otherworldly patrons or to restrain themselves by only using verbal magic. They use their arcane knowledge and familiarity with the runes used in enchanting to create and wield runic spells. By absorbing the remnant knowledge sealed into this crystal, you will unlock the 'Runebound Spell weaver's related skill-line.}

{Legacy requirement: 12 erudition, intellect and willpower.}

{Do you accept this inheritance?}

‘An alternate spell casting method,’ he mumbled. ‘That sounds powerful and it’s an uncommon inheritance too.’ With the decision made, he accepted the inheritance and the crystal crumbled between his fingers. Weakened as he was, the rush of headache and dizziness washed over him like a typhoon, but a good minute later he managed to absorb most of the knowledge sealed into the crystal. His face turned into a grimace as soon as it was over.

As it turned out; this runebound spell casting was indeed an offshoot spell class. Just from the surface memory he knew that it would be as much of a hassle as it would be powerful. This method required a deep understanding of the runic language that most wizards and alchemists only used to enchant items, along with a deep knowledge of lore. Although the crystal imprinted a few whole and partial-runes into his mind, he already knew most of them from Taveran’s and the dead earth wizard’s journals.

Half desperate, half hopeful, he searched the nobleman’s corpse for any useful items, but he only found a shredded book in the man’s satchel and a shattered sceptre beside the corpse. ‘Soulbound gear.’ He thought as he pocketed the cracked arcanite stone he scavenged before continuing to rummage through the noble youth’s fancy looking bag. He knew well that someone would retrieve the corpse in the morning, so he couldn’t take any of his items that could have been easily recognised later. The sight of the hardened glass vials with one of them still full of a blood red liquid however was all too tempting.

{Potion of minor healing}

{Item rarity: common}

{Item quality: waste}

{This watered down healing brew heals 40 points of health in 1 minute.}

Regis uncorked the potion and after he chugged it down, he put the empty vial back with the others. The rest of the satchel was filled with useless items and a coin pouch hefty of silver thalers he half-emptied into his spare one before putting it back. Sadly, the nobleman had no spell scrolls with him and since his tome destroyed itself, there was nothing he could save. The dead youth only wore fancy jewelleries and a thin longsword with a lavishly decorated sheath.

After shaking his head at the fact that he was getting far too greedy, the dark elf turned towards the rest of the undead corpses, freeing them from any coin or useable gear. Regis then pricked his finger with his knife and used the corpse sacrifice spell on the foes he killed. One red, two blue and three green shards later he grabbed his bundled loot and headed back towards the city wall. With the corpses dealt with and the potion healing most of his wounds, only the slight dizziness and tiredness hindered him in moving forward.

After a hard fought battle against an undead swordsman and a hatchet wielding infantryman that stumbled too close to him in the darkness, he finally managed to reach the area lit by the torches. It was a dismaying sight as the defenders were slowly pushed back by the large number of undead that came in waves.

“Oi,” a guard yelled at the young dark elf. “You’re the lad with the 9th guard troops, aren’t you? We’re retreating, so hurry up and get inside!”

Both the guardsmen, mercenaries and refugees began to scurry back from the battlefield as the portcullis rose up to about half way. Regis took a deep breath and after gritting his teeth, he ran towards the large bundle of loot he left at the nearby ramparts. He could barely carry his hoard of junk in his current state, but he still refused to leave his hard earned things behind, just like many others. The fallen almost caught up to him and the slower refugees when a trio of robe wearing men holding staves walked through the city gates.

Regis recognised one of them as the wizard whom he talked with at the barracks earlier. The trio of men stopped in front of the gate, pointing their staves and sceptres at the incoming wave of undead. Once through the gate, Regis chanced a look back at them, only to see a large amount of fire bursting forward from the magic staves. The sight was similar to the fire spewed from the army’s flamethrowers in the movies. Dozens of undead were caught in the cone shaped breath of fire, turning into charred corpses in mere seconds. The flames gushed forward without stopping even as the wizards began to edge back behind the gates one step at the time.

As they got behind the marking line of the gates, the flames stopped and the portcullis dropped back down. Once the fire died down, a large number of undead shambled over the burnt corpses, only to get arrows and stones rain down on them from the city wall. A heavy tiredness caught hold of the young dark elf, but a firm grasp on his shoulder shook him up.

“Stop daydreaming lad,” the unknown guard said. “The rest of the 9th guard troops and your friends have already gone to the city lord’s manor. They’ve told us to take you there if you managed to survive, so come on!”

“Did they all make it out alive?”

“That depends on how many of them were there to begin with?”

“There was a tall woman and a short one, along with two men.”

“Yes,” the guard nodded as they walked. “The tall lassie was carrying the other one on her shoulder while the two men followed along, dragging large piles of arms and armour.”

“Good,” Regis sighed. “At least they’re fine. What about the 9th guard troops.”

“They’ve lost a man, but the rest made it inside.”

The guardsman led a shambling Regis through the crowded cobblestone streets towards the centre of Hunor, which was separated by another large wall and gates from the commoner district of the city.