Elonia took a shuddering breath, heart clenching as she took in the sight of her brother taking on a half dozen heavily warded Inquisitors. All of them radiating death’s promise. All of them armed to the teeth.

  And as became utterly clear, they weren’t going to hold back one bit, even as Eric faced them with nothing on but the pair of blue jeans she recognized so well. An artifact that seemed to last just as long as him… even when everything else crumbled before his ascension.

  He wasn’t even armed with his sword!

  Just cold eyes, clenched fists, and a killer’s smile.

  And that’s when she saw it. A hologram now playing a recording on a Blue Corp entertainment center that Agent Evelyn pulled out like it was nothing from a convenient storage ring.

  A hologram that instantly captivated Elonia and her entire court, showing images of the inquisitors as they interrogated Blue Corp executives from the agent’s point of view.

  Sint and the others stiffened, eyes going wide and turning to witness their own recordings as well.

  Recordings that showed agents slamming desperate Blue Corp professionals in back rooms, forcing them to sign various documents, beating several senseless, leaving one spasming and foaming at the mouth, before he was coldly executed, his body put in an Extra Storage device.

  Recordings that showed a pair entering Blue Corp S&L and presenting a safe deposit box key where they pulled free a manila document, looked over a writhing black contract, then nodded with satisfaction and heading back the way they had come.

  Recordings showing Sint meeting with a man who looked quite like the recently fallen Merc Smith.

  “You have the documents, Sint?”

  “Damn right I do. When this is done, Freetown and Arcadia will be up for grabs.”

  “Excellent. Here’s your card. One hundred million credits, cashable at any Snicklit bank. As promised.”

  Sint and the others stiffened. “What the hell is that?”

  Agent Evelyn winked. “What does it look like, Sint?”

  The man glared Evelyn’s way. “So that’s what those ruby pins were for. Very clever, bitch! So, it’s blackmale? You and Hroka want a cut of the action, is that it?”

  The chamber rang with her laughter. “Oh you’d better believe we want a cut of the action!” She clapped her hands with excited glee. “Normally, your delicious degree of corruption would result in an absolutely agonizing death as an example to all. But you happen to find yourself in a Trial by Combat, where all transgressions can be wiped away in the crucible of battle. Isn’t that wonderful?”

  Sint furrowed his brow. “What are you saying?”

  She winked at a stunned Hroka, who was only now pulling himself away from the travesty playing before them, face an odd mixture of outrage and regret.

  He inhaled to speak, but Evelyn cut him off with a smile. “What Major Hroka and I are saying is that, should you actually manage to best my disciple, you six get to walk, free and clear, with a clean slate!”

  Only then did Sint and at least a few of the others seem get it, eyes widening as if only truly understanding who was passing judgment upon them.

  As one, they fell to their knees.

  “It’s you. Isn’t it?” Whispered the trembling female among them. “After all these years of silence. We… we had given up hope. We lost our way. We just needed your guidance! Please, Your—”

  Her desperate plea died before Evelyn’s glare.

  “No more words. The time for contrition and redemption has past. Now it is about proving yourselves in the crucible of combat. Proving your worth in the only arena that matters.”

  She flashed a smile dark and cold. “Two paths lie before you. Fight my disciple, or face my judgment. Now walk your path.”

  Sint’s eyes bulged. “Oh gods’ mercy…” He turned to glare a smirking Eric’s way before nodding to his fellows.

  “You boys ready? We got one chance at proving ourselves and getting out of here alive, so that’s what we’re going to do!”

  “Right on, Sint!” Whispered the girl, the four other men nodding in worldless accord.

  He flashed a relieved smile. “Good.” Then he turned his attention to Eric, gazing so coldly at them all.

  Elonia couldn’t help but quail, sensing the malice in those Inquisitorial gazes

  “You’re dead, you little shit! Alpha Capture and Kill!” Sint roared, obviously code of some sort as one man threw a handful of formation flags that blazed to flaring life right around Eric’s smirking form while another screamed a quick hyperspeak chant that unleashed a flaring net as agents three through five opened up a stream of potent blaster fire.

  Hitting absolutely nothing.

  For Eric was now behind the formation flag thrower.

  “Okay, let’s add to the difficulty. If you shits can even hit me…”

  Sint roared and lashed out with his crackling blade of black flame.

  Striking absolutely nothing.

  “I will let you cut off my head. Assuming you can.”

  Eric then turned to the coolly smiling Lady Evelyn who, it seemed to Elonia, must be the true ring leader of the Inquisitors.

  And why were Yuki and Richard still kowtowing before Lady Evelyn when Eric was already fighting for their lives?

  A question for a less perilous time.

  Yet the only thing odder than his odd look of hope was the bemused agent’s dip of her head. “Acceptable, Disciple.”

  Elise’s eyes bulged, thoughts racing even as her sense of time blazed to a degree that was almost painful.

  Disciple. Wait… she had called him that several times! What exactly did she mean by that? Eric was the farthest thing from an Inquisitor!

  Then she looked, truly looked at the woman coolly smiling at the battle.

  A woman who then turned impossibly fast to meet Elonia’s awed gaze and wink.

  Wink an almond brown eye in a beautiful oval face with high cheekbones and silky dark hair, possessing distinctly beautiful asiatic features.

  Mongolian Features.

  Agent Evelyn was no purple-eyed offworlder.

  She was human.

  Or had once been.

  Yet the power she radiated now…

  No way in hell she was any simple Inquisitor.

  Her insane brother, never one to shy away from risks, smiled coldly at the half dozen men now roaring and charging him.

  “Ten seconds. Give it your best shot. I won’t even fight back.”

  Sint snarled and spat. Eyes flashing. “Bastard’s warded by magic. Thinks to throw us off our game!” He flashed a cruel smile. “Vibro blades, boys. It will cut through tungsten and nothing can resist. Greys. Alan. By me. We strike as—”

  “Six.”

  “Now, boys!”

  Elonia’s eyes widened in horror when the three men that had circled around Eric began to glow with multiple perks and feats suddenly in play at her brother’s rear with their deadly crackling blades flaring with forces far beyond any electromana weapon, no matter how sophisticated. Just as Sint and his two cronies activated force shields and crackling traps surrounding a smirking Eric too arrogant to even jump out of the way of the crimson pentagram configuration.

  Sint smirked and chortled before whispering words Elonia was dreadfully certain no one beyond their little circle could here. But seeing as this was Elonia’s domain...

  “Goodbye, you little shit. The Song and Augustus clans both send their regards.”

  “Eric, it’s a trap!” She wanted to scream it allowed. Desperately. But her mind was now processing at speeds beyond what even a mid-tier Bronze body could endure.

  And Evelyn Death was coldly shaking her head.

  “Charge!”

  The three sneering inquisitors raced forward before seeming to flicker and disappear, suddenly before their compatriots as the crimson pentagram flared with deadly black flame.

  Yet the Inquisitors’ fierce pleased smiles quickly became frustrated scowls.

  “Where is he? Death’s Kiss should have obliterated him!” One of the three roared, spinning around and snarling with frustration.

  “Five.”

  Sint spat in surprise and glared when a smirking Eric was right where he had been before the charge… as if he hadn’t even moved at all. He just winked and gave his enemies the middle finger.

  The inquisitors didn’t waste their breath with outrage or insults. All six just pulled a Tier-III sniper rifles from god knew where and filled the dome with crackling beams of energy.

  All six inquisitors were blasting the come with an absolutely devastating amount of force.

  Irene paled. “Those weapons shouldn’t be here.”

  Elonia coolly smirked at the would be dragon queen that had nearly bitten off far more than she could chew. “Afraid those weapons could cook your clan?”

  Irene glared at her, before lowering her head. Elonia blinked, realizing in that moment that they were both thinking and processing at shocking speeds.

  “Clearly, I underestimated my would-be prey.”

  “You’re lucky my brother didn’t take your head.”

  “I’m lucky your Arcadia found the story of my comeuppance engaging enough not to obliterate me outright. And for that mercy, I’m grateful.” Irene grimaced, but bowed her head like the defeated queen she envisioned herself to be, even as Eric’s voice rang eerily through Elonia’s entire palatial compound.

  “Two.”

  “Cut him down!”

  “One.”

  Sint roared, arms outstretched as he raced to grab Eric.

  “I’ll tear your face off your skull, you fey little bast—”

  Sint’s eyes bulged.

  Trembling hands now desperately clawed at his own throat, desperate to stop his lifeblood from spraying over all his stunned fellows.

  Failing miserably as he collapsed in death.

  The one known as Tril was the first to react, bright purple eyes widening with horror, the sweat of exertion becoming the reak of terror as he spun his shaggy head about, in desperate search of whatever force had just torn out Sint’s throat.

  “He’s striking from the shadows! Circle up, we’ll take him out to—”

  The other inquisitors, racing together under Tril’s command lurched back in startled cries when the man’s head exploded.

  Jellified blood, muscle, and bone sprayed in a fine crimson mist throughout the entire dome as the resulting supersonic shockwave caused even Bronze Tier elites to stumble. And in several cases, when their underlying resistances faltered, cry out and clap their unprotected ears.

  Then all was bloody smoke and shadows, such that the crowd could only see crimson flickers when disciplined orders became panicked shouts then desperate pleas as the sound of ripping flesh shivered down Elonia’s spine.

  “I didn’t see it! What happened. How? How?” Screamed one of the four remaining men.

  “He’s a monster! Tril’s head exploded!”

  “Quarter!”

  “Mercy!”

  Elonia noted her people, so cheerful and merry, so filled with warmth and tenderness and the twinkling eyes of graceful souls happy to give any struggling human boy or girl looking for a better life the opportunity to forge a beautiful story in this tiny corner of Faerie by their side.

  It was everything a forlorn dreamer could hope for.

  But here and now, her people gazed with the cold intensity of wolves eagerly watching one of their own dispense the most savage form of justice. As if they could see perfectly beyond the swirling storm of ever more opaque crimson mist trembling in their air.

  Trembling before one who had mastery over blood itself.

  Somehow, they sensed him stalking his prey with no trouble at all.

  As did their queen.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  “He’s coming closer!” Screamed one doomed Inquisitor sobbing and lurching back, blaster firing wildly into the crimson fog, before slipping on the entrails of who knew how many of his fellow inquisitors.

  Collapsing to his armored rear with a scream.

  “Ebba! No! Heaven’s mercy. He’s not human! He tore Ebba into pieces! Open up, Hroka! No… no… NO!!”

  “Open the barrier, Hroka!” Screamed Freja, the one female in the half dozen Inquisitors slated for sacrifice. “This is no ascended Mortal! It’s a Deep Silver monster! Please, we survived long enough, haven’t we? Only a few of us our left! We’re sorry! Please let us atone! It’s coming closer! It’s coming closer… Please!”

  Elonia’s heart twisted in knots.

  She knew her brother. The sweet goofball he so often was with her.

  The wild-eyed killer, whenever his family was threatened.

  She had seen the cold contempt in the Inquisitors’ gazes.

  They had come as part of a convoluted coup as Inquisitor Evelyn’s recordings so clearly showed. Planting evidence, false testimony, conspiring with the former Merk Smith to dethrone her and claim all of Freetown and New Arcadia in return for an absolute fortune.

  And none of it mattered.

  Because Eric wouldn’t play their games.

  He’d just claim their heads, whether it be hotblooded dragon, corrupt Inquisitor, or conniving coldblooded bureaucrat.

  He’d slaughter them, one and all.

  Or he’d die trying.

  Yet still.

  The face of an Inquisitor pressed up against the forcefield somehow caught her gaze, screaming for quarter as she banged fruitlessly upon the barrier.

  Then her eyes bulged with one final panicked cry as Elonia’s wild-eyed brother tore out the doomed woman’s beating heart… and devoured it with the eyes of a gluttonous wolf.

  Autumn’s Child seizing his prize.

  Claiming his due.

  Feasting upon nature’s bounty.

  Evolution’s harvest.

  Fattening himself up in incomprehensible ways.

  Readying himself for Winter’s sheering knife.

  And he didn’t even know.

  Didn’t know that he too embraced a role as old as Sylvankind.

  As old as time.

  Elonia couldn’t help but wince, feeling a sudden flare of pity for those Inquisitors who would have no doubt gladly arranged for her execution, so she really shouldn’t feel anything for them at all.

  And that truth didn’t keep her from closing her eyes and choking back a scream or a sob, or whatever the awful hot mass now swelling up in her chest was, as hot tears rolled down her cheeks.

  Then she glared up at the gorgeous fresco painted upon the palatial ceiling, high above her head, a glorious tapestry of rich colors and autumn highlights caressing the beautiful features of her brother’s still countenance in the center of a lush wooden glade.

  “Sorry. Wrong queen, assholes. That’s one tale I will never tell. One betrayal I will never commit!” She glared at the exquisitely layered and rendered masterwork, all but daring the land itself to take offense at her cold declaration that she would be no puppet. Not even to the kingdom that promised so much.

  Yet her realm took no offense.

  How could it?

  For she was its eternal queen.

  And winter was finally coming.

  She could feel it in the air.

  ***

  “It is done!” Agent Evelyn declared, eyes twinkling warmly under the palatial chandeliers.

  Hroka dipped his head. “Good. Then we are done with this regrettable affair. I’ll let you take care of—”

  His words died off, eyes widening in horrified dismay to see not six upright glaring inquisitors making full use of their physique and training, but one solitary youth on the cusp of manhood. A wild-eyed killer wearing nothing but gore-stained pants, his naked chest revealing a sleek, powerfully built physique that was utterly splattered with gobbets of flesh and blood.

  Blood that absolutely drenched the marble floor in a perfectly round circle marking the boundary of the now dispelled force dome.

  “Heavens mercy. He shredded an elite squad of battle-tempered Bronze all by himself! Silver? Is the boy actually a Silver?” Hroka gazed with dismay at the remains of his men. Wide eyed panic painted upon the final expressions of half his crew.

  And the other half…

  Obliterated before the might of what had to be a Silver-Tier Contender.

  There was no other explanation.

  None at all.

  “Who are you?”

  His words hung in the air.

  He calmed his own pounding heart when that strikingly beautiful youth gazed at him with his terrible blue eyes. Nothing like the pure violet blue of the true people, but a wild stormy bright sea blue that was alien to Hroka’s kind.

  Yet not to the tribes of elves and man from which this boy had supposedly sprung.

  The deadly youth flashed a bloody smile. “Eric Silver. Ernest Edgelord Slaughter. And most definitely not at your service.”

  His eyes flashed with deadly heat.

  Hroka stumbled back in genuine surprise at his fearsome killing aura.

  “Monstrous. How! There’s no way…”

  The youth then howled for joy and began to glow.

  Hroka’s eyes widened with shocked disbelief.

  “He ascends. Before our very eyes… he would dare to ascend his very race? How!”

  The air filled with Lady Evelyn’s throaty laughter.

  “Oh yes. My beautiful disciple has just ascended six full rungs, his boon for daring to take on and purge our institution of six fallen fools who will taint our pristine cause no further!”

  Hroka stiffened. He took a shuddering breath, his skin taking on a waxy pallor.

  Slowly, he turned around, panicked eyes gazing at his smiling assistant who he had taken so lightly.

  So casually.

  Lady Evelyn. Who could only be Empress Evelyn Exalt.

  Once known as Evelyn Khan. Lady Death.

  Queen of Evolution. Mistress of Peril’s Path.

  Native-born of Terra.

  The one woman who had dared to ascend to Gold with the aid of no master at all.

  The one Gold that Emperor Exalt refused to exile or kill.

  He married her instead.

  For she was the one being that could force-evolve any worthy disciple. Infusing them not just with power, but with the echoes of their feats passing on to countless future generations.

  Yet the price they paid…

  To eternally battle against perilous odds, knowing that any mistake could well be their last.

  He should have known.

  It was right in front of him the entire time!

  He crashed to his knees, trembling, choking back a sob.

  “Pray forgive this fool, Your Eminence. We have failed you!”

  His mistress, both empress and the founding head of their order, calmly shook her head.

  “Come, Major Hroka. We have an investigation to finish.” Her eyes brightened, her impish grin now matching that of his assistant once more, Gold Aura thankfully suppressed, for no planet save Exalt Prime could possibly bear the weight of their fully revealed potency, even if this territory, so rich with Faerie’s potency, had held up surprisingly well. Yet now she appeared as innocuous as any Bronze.

  Effortlessly.

  She tilted her head, gazing at him curiously. “Don’t you have a conference to attend?”

  Hroka blanched. Features taking on an odd palor. “No local politicking counsel could possibly be worthy of your—” He shivered before Evelyn’s cool smile. “That is… yes, yes I do! With the Terran Counsel’s key representatives. They wish to discuss their absurd case for surrendering which we shall refuse, unless you say otherwise, of course, and the… ahem… proposed purge of all Silver Tier elites.

  He turned to give a pointed look at Arcadia’s prince.

  The wild-eyed youth covered in blood that shimmered like fire before fading from his flesh flashed a smile both hideous and wide.

  “Sorry! No Silver-Tier Contenders here!” The nightmare abomination in the shape of an innocent white rabbit calmly informed the trembling Hroka.

  Evelyn snorted. She calmly turned to the bruised and battered man who had gazed at the proceedings first with horrified dismay then a growing sense of wonder… even hope in his tired eyes.

  “If you would be a dear and set up the projecting array, Caliban?”

  Prince Caerulus stiffened before slamming fist to chest in a salute. “My honor, Your Eminence.”

  Within seconds Caliban exchanged a tentative nod with Hroka.

  “May I assist you?”

  “Please.”

  ***

  As smoothly as that, the two were working together, revealing a degree of technical prowess that a certain scowling young prince knew was utterly beyond him.

  He couldn’t even program his microwave clock.

  Not that that was an issue anymore.

  “Don’t worry, Eric!” Bun Soothed, patting his head. “With all those oddly stacking Repair perks, you’re a shoe-in to learn any profession-related construction or technical skill. And trigonometry and electromana engineering? Hell yes! Why, I’ll bet that Conceptio will EAGERLY stuff silvery tendrils of knowledge into your screaming brain the minute you pick up that power wrench over there!”

  Eric swallowed. “Yeah… I think I’ll pass?”

  Bunbun snorted. “This from the boy who happily imprinted the entire electromana blueprint of a Hyperion Deathblaze plasma rifle straight into his brain, all so he could learn to how to use a magical wand…”

  “Yeah, but that was blood-magic. Super shivery and awesome. Whereas doing it the other way…”

  His familiar gave him a pointed look.

  “Feels, well…”

  “Yes?”

  “Icky.”

  She sighed. “Icky.”

  Eric nodded solemnly. “And Slithery.”

  Bunbun blinked rather critically before snickering. “Icky and Slithery. That’s your threshold for lines you won’t cross, power you won’t strive for. Not extreme hardship and peril. Not putting your life on the line… but just to avoid the icky slithers.”

  Eric paled and shivered. “Please don’t ever say that combination of words together again, Bun. ‘Icky slithers… UGH! Makes me think of a big pile of snakes and slugs and worms all SQUIRMING together with squiggling cockroaches. For some reason, my Mental Resistance doesn’t counter it. It’s almost as bad as—”

  “Moist.”

  “Bunbun!”

  His rabbit snorted. “Seriously? Seven hundred points in that defense? One full magnitude beyond imperial dreadnought armor plating toughness doesn’t even buy you resistance against…” She whispered in his ear.

  He paled, eyes filling with teary-eyed betrayal. “I told you not to—”

  “Moist.”

  “Bun!!”

  “Poor, handsome hero. So epically awesome, yet still shockingly vulnerable to the absolute best way to describe a MOIST and delicious brownie.” His familiar cackled with glee before her eyes widened as the smiling conductor of this little operation approached them.

  She quickly sketched an ear-flopping a bow.

  “Eric!”

  But he was no fool, already falling into dogeza… before freezing when his master gave the tiniest shake of her head.

  Before flashing an almost playful smile, tossing a pearlescent crystalline ball his way.

  Then she turned to Princess Irene… and Elonia as well.

  “Catch!” She commanded.

  All three did so.

  The dragon princess paled and trembled when she gazed within its shimmering surface, hers showing a silver pearlescence to its sheen.

  “What does it say, Irene?”

  She paled, lowering her Gaze. “Silver, Tier One, Your Eminence.”

  Evelyn smiled, dipping her head. “Very good. And I suspect I have just the solution you need to break through your piss-poor ascension and finally be worthy of ascending the ranks of Silver!”

  Irene’s cheeks flushed with bright shame, even as her eyes glittered with desperate hope.

  She immediately kowtowed before Evelyn. “Thank you, Your Eminence!”

  Evelyn gave the tiniest of nods, then turned to Eric’s sister. “Elonia?”

  Elonia flushed. “Elite Bronze. Rank 49, Your Eminence.”

  This earned a delicately raised brow.

  Elonia paled and swallowed. “It also says… Standard Silver… Rank 2.”

  Her confession earned multiple raised brows and whispers.

  “She has an Elite Bronze class.”

  “She’s the equivalent of Silver already?”

  “Our queen truly is worthy of her crown!”

  “I had no doubt.”

  “Excellent.” Evelyne’s smile was almost pitying. “Though I can give you no advice, I’m afraid. The Path of Peril is clearly not your own.”

  Elonia flushed, bowing her head to hide the sudden flare of humiliation she felt. Did the empress understand that intimately all her weaknesses, pitfalls and failings?

  She winced, cheeks blazing brightly.

  She was the empress. Of course she did. Hell, she probably understood Elonia’s failings in both the lives she almost recalled living. Yet the shockingly powerful Gold mocked her not at all, her gaze already focused on the one person in Elonia’s royal hall that she looked genuinely interested in.

  Elonia’s brother

  A boy the deadly woman gazed upon with unmistakable hunger.

  “Disciple?”

  “Silver.”

  The room grew oddly silent as he locked gazes with the smiling head of the entire Inquisitorial Order.

  “Rank 33.”

  Irene blanched and stumbled back while Evelyn laughed and applauded.

  “Well done, Disciple!”

  Even Caliban paused in his work, fusing arcane magics with stubborn copper wires. “Remarkable.” He then turned to his companion. “Y cable goes there, Major.”

  “Ah yes, quite right. So… your partner is an exceedingly powerful Silver, then?”

  Caliban snorted. “A youth with approximately two years experience fighting for his life as a Contender.” He sighed, rubbing his temple and wincing. “Or it could be much less time than that. His peril even more condensed than we realize. Artifacts were in play, you see.”

  His words earned a cool glance from the empress.

  Caliban stiffened. “And I will say no more than that.”

  Hroka blinked. “He achieved that level of power in two years… not two centuries or half a millenia? He is quite formidable.”

  “Indeed he is.”

  The man coughed. “I… regret that we met under such unfortunate circumstances.”

  A still bruised and battered Caliban chuckled, eyes twinkling as he gazed upon the absolute savagery of Eric’s condensed killing field. “Reparations have been made in full, I think… and that’s the last of the cords.”

  The empress gave a pleased nod. “Excellent. Now please be so good as to initiate the conference with our patiently waiting Terran Counsel, Hroka, while Prince Caerulus readies the memory stick our shy little Nikita went to such efforts to entice me with.”

  Caliban paled.

  Lady Evelyn winked, then turned to Eric as a massive thrumming force field turned to a theater sized silver screen.

  “If you would be so kind, Eric? No need to bore the world with an in-house matter.”

  “At once, Sifu.” Eric placed single finger within the glistening soup of blood and entrails and horrified countenances that had been so eager to frame and murder him… and it was done.

  Effortlessly.

  The chamber was absolutely spotless.

  No fragments of blood or bone or faces twisted in rictuses of unspeakable pain. No heads torn off their bodies like squeezing blocks of bloody tofu.

  No sign of half a dozen brutally slaughtered assholes, whatsoever.

  And despite how easy it was to make all evidence of his shocking violence disappear, so all anyone saw was a spotless marble floor and the clean countenance of the calm, smiling young man that he now appeared to be, he still managed to rank a key skill.

  You have instantaneously stored away the remains of all your elite foes (and all their toys!) to be raised, or buried at a time and place of your choosing.

  Congratulations! Flesh Sculptor is now Rank 34.

  And not at all because the empress is watching you!