The two walked back to the kid, and Jasper knelt down in front of him, the knife in his hand. “Alright. Before I let you go, I’ve just got to do a little test, to make sure you’re telling us the truth.” The boy’s face paled and he started to struggle against the ropes again.

Jasper’s heart sank. Damn. He slid the knife across the palm of his hand, slicing it open, and spoke the spell. Sin Eater.

Please don’t work, please don't work. He winced as the wound knit itself shut in an instant, the palm of his hand so thoroughly restored that he couldn’t even see a hint of where he had cut himself. Crap.

“There’s no point in lying, kid - my hand tells the truth. You’re one of the cultists, aren't you?”

The boy spat in his face, as fear and rage fought for control. The struggle was brief, fear quickly triumphing over anger, as the lad collapsed into uncontrollable tears. “Please don’t kill me. I just did what I was told. I’ll do anything - just don’t kill me.”

Jasper turned to Ihra. “What do we do? I can’t - I can’t kill him. He’s just a teen.”

She sank down beside him, a hand on his shoulder. “If he’s following Gemlir’s cult, he sacrificed an innocent person and then ate their heart to steal their power for his own. And in order to grow his power, he needs to keep killing and keep consuming. Once someone’s tasted the power of consuming souls, they never stop."

“He may just be a boy, but he’s also a cultist. Cultists are like a gangrenous wound that can't be healed. You either cut the limb off, or it will spread through your body and kill you.”

The boy wept, begging and pleading, his shoulders shaking with heaving sobs. Jasper closed his eyes, the tears sliding down his face. Purge.

The boy’s tears abruptly ceased as his throat burned with a fire that spread throughout his body until he slumped over, withered to little more than a husk.

Jasper’s stomach turned inside out, as he heaved its contents on the smoldering ground, tears mixing with bitter bile. Curse this world. What kind of sick, twisted place is this?

Finally, he lurched himself off the ground. Ihra watched him with concern and stretched out an arm to comfort him. "You did what you had to do."

He shrugged her arm off, turning away too quickly to see the disappointed look that flitted across her face. “Whatever. Let’s just get this over with,” he growled.

They made their way back to the camp, quietly creeping through the underbrush as a bright full moon shone overhead. The camp was no longer sleeping peacefully. Apparently, the boy’s absence had been noticed. The central fire had been stoked high, its fire pushing back the night, and the cult members wandered around in the woods, calling out the boy’s name. “Shomei! Shomei!”

They swiftly took cover in a bush, surveying the now alert camp. Jasper grimaced. So much for taking them by surprise. As they quietly debated their new plan, two of the searchers approached their bush, a torch held in their hands. With a quick glance, Jasper saw that none of the other cultists were close, and quickly cast Purge on the two cultists. The two silently gasped, clutching at their throats as the spell burned through their body, and two arrows from Ihra embedded themselves in their brains.

The cultists fell to the ground with a quiet thump, and he waited with bated breath for the other cultists to react. An interminable moment passed in silence, and he sighed in relief. They didn’t see us. Then the cultists’ clothes caught fire, set aflame by the torch they had been holding. The bright light stood out in the dark forest like a beacon. Jasper lunged forward, trying to beat the flames out, but it was too late.

One of the closer cultists turned to look at the light, and caught Jasper red-handed, crouching over the blazing corpses of his friends.

“Intrude-” His cry was cut short as an arrow lodged into his throat, but it was enough. The others turned to see their comrade slump to the ground, the dark figure of his presumed attacker backlit in the light of a fire. The erstwhile villagers charged at him, as their cries of rage echoed in the moonlit woods.

Jasper cast two Sacred Stars at them, and several were immediately immolated by the fiery explosions. The fire quickly spread through the thick underbrush, but the remaining cultists were undeterred. With a grin, he reached for another spell to cast at the charging villagers. We got this. An arrow materialized out of the dark, narrowly missing his neck, and he stumbled back, wildly searching for the hidden archer. Several more arrows arced towards him, and he threw himself to the ground, swiftly crawling through the tall wild grass towards the shelter of a tree, while Ihra, still hidden in the bush, returned fire, her keen aim swiftly removing one of the archers.

The cool forest night was entirely transformed as the fire spread quickly through the woods, the air hot and heavy with smoke. From the cover of the tree, Jasper cast another Sacred Star, but grimaced as it entirely missed the cultists. Damn it, I can't see them through this haze. He stepped out from the tree, eyes straining to make out their forms in the hellish glow of the flames. Can't keep missing them.

A moment later, he found himself flying forward through the air. He landed near the burning corpses of the cultists, as a terrible, cold pain radiated from below his rib cage. His lungs burned as he sucked in the acrid smoke, his eyes watering from the haze. Looking down at the source of his pain, Jasper saw an icy shard protruding from his stomach, the ice already melting away from the searing heat of the fire. Somehow he managed to push himself off the ground, stumbling towards the cover of a nearby tree. Come on. One more step.

Another shard hit him in the shoulder, the force of the blow spinning him around, and tossing him back on the ground. He lay there for a second, stunned, as his blood stained the ground. The sound of shattering filled his ears, as another ice shard buried itself into the ground beside him. A second later, a strangled scream echoed in the woods behind him.

He lay there, fumbling in his bag for a healing potion. No more ice shards landed near him. Hopefully that means Ihra took him out. As his hand finally closed on the potion, several cultists emerged from the smoky fog. Two of them held axes in their hands, the third a bow and an arrow.

They didn't see him at first, and Jasper held his breath, praying they would walk away. But then, the archer's eyes locked on him. "There." With a scream, the melee fighters rushed forward, as the archer stayed behind, taking careful aim.

Fiery Shackles. Jasper cast his new spell, freezing them in their tracks. The melee fighters howled with pain as their ankles snapped under the stress of their momentum. He cast Purge again a second after the archer released her arrow. The projectile slammed into his chest, burying itself so deep that the tip protruded from his back, while the archer fell to the ground with a muffled gurgle, her throat burning with the flames of judgment.

Struggling to stay conscious, Jasper grabbed the arrow with both hands and pulled with the last remnants of his strength. His screams echoed through the night as the arrow finally popped free, the barbed head ripping through his flesh. The Fiery Shackle spell ended, and the two melee fighters dragged themselves across the ground, unable to stand on their broken ankles. He cast Fiery Shackles on them again and followed it up with Sin Eater. He gasped as a stream of health flowed into him, and with renewed strength, he finally managed to tear open the potion's lid and pour the sweet nectar down his throat. Two arrows flew past him, burrowing into the skulls of the trapped cultists, as Jasper shakily arose from the ground.

Ihra emerged through the smoke and helped him up. He leaned against her, his body still weak from the drain of the potion. In the fiery haze around them, they could hear the cries of the cultists. “Retreat! Pull back into the shrine.”

“You okay there, fire-boy?” Ihra spoke in jest, but her tone was laced with an ill-concealed concern.

He gasped for breath in the acrid air, his lungs burning.“Let’s go. We need to get out of this smoke before we pass out.”

They stumbled through the burning woods, Ihra confidently navigating through the smoke - must be nice to have such high vision - before finally breaking free of the conflagration. Jasper watched as the fire quickly spread through the woods, leaping from tree to tree as pillars of smoke billowed into the sky. Crap. I hope I didn’t just start a major forest fire. At least it wasn’t for a gender-reveal party, he consoled himself.

But as they ran through the woods, a cold wind, like the icy winds of winter’s depth, blew past him. The previously clear skies darkened rapidly as the heavens opened up. Freezing cold rain pelted down upon them, quenching the fire and soaking them to the bone.

They ran for some time, afraid to turn back, but his strength quickly flagged; potions could only do so much. At last, he could run no longer and collapsed beneath a tree. Its leafy boughs offered a small measure of relief from the relentless rain, as he leaned against the trunk. His teeth chattering from the sudden onslaught of the icy rains, Jasper hugged his arms tight around him, desperately trying to conserve some measure of warmth. “Where the hell did all this rain come from? It was a cloudless night,”

Ihra, also drenched from the pouring rain, was too cold and tired to respond to his strange question. Everyone knew that the spirits protected the forests. She uttered a silent prayer to them, pleading with them to overlook their transgressions. We meant no harm. She shuddered at the thought of facing an angry spirit - that was a fight they couldn’t win, at least not yet. Despite herself, she found herself pressed against him, her desire for warmth from the cold rains outweighing her dislike of physical contact.

It was late in the night when the rain finally stopped. With the rains gone, Jasper summoned the blue flames from his hands, letting them spread across his body. Within minutes he was warm and dry. Ihra, still thoroughly drenched, watched with a sour look on her face. “Why is it that you started the fire, but I’m the one that got wet,” she groused.

Jasper shrugged, a grin lurking on his lips. “I guess that’s the perks of being a fire-boy.”

She sighed, wringing water out of her hair. “So what’s the plan now that all hope of a surprise attack is lost?”

“There’s what, maybe ten of them left? You killed the ice mage, right?”

“Yeah, I got him. But if one of them had a mage class, we have to assume there could be at least one more. With a couple of archers and a mage, they could probably put up a pretty stout defense from the safety of the shrine's walls. I don’t know if we can take them. And what about the villagers? We can’t just exterminate a village. We’re going to have to go to the guild with what we know.”

They debated their options for a while. Jasper hated the idea of just leaving, without finishing the job, but eventually Ihra persuaded him that it was the best option. As they finally came to an agreement, the ground beneath them suddenly trembled. Tendrils oozed out of the soft earth, quickly wrapping around their hands and feet and dragging them back against the tree. It took Jasper a second to realize that the tendrils were roots, the rough bark scraping against his skin like sandpaper. As they struggled against their bonds, two arrows flew past their heads, embedding themselves in the trunk. Several men and women stepped out from the shadow of the trees, and, lurking behind the knees of one of the women, were two kids.

One of them drew close, a big, burly man with the shoulders of a linebacker and a bent nose that suggested a familiarity with brawls. “So you’re the bastards who attacked us last night.” He spat at the ground in front of them, a thick, blackish glob of spittle. He looked over them, a gleam of contempt in his eyes. “You really thought you could take us all out? You’re little more than lion whelps.” He bent down, pushing his face within inches of Jasper’s. The man let out a low laugh, before spitting directly in Jasper’s face. Jasper coughed and spluttered, as some of the liquid got in his eyes, stinging sharply. The man stood back up, a cruel smile on his face.

He swept his hand back to the group waiting behind him.“Unfortunately for you, we've found ourselves in need of a few fresh travelers. Seeing as how you’ve reduced our numbers, I think it’s only fair you recompense us for our troubles. It's time for the young’uns to ascend.”

A wide grin split his face. “Times have been a little tough out here in the forest, but tonight? Tonight, we’ll be eating well.”