"Are you really planning on pouting the whole trip?" Samantha asked as they were jostled around in their wagon, somehow managing to sound both teasing and nervous at the same time. "I told you we didn't need to buy so many!"

"I'm not pouting," he argued, before realizing he had in fact been frowning slightly as they descended the mountain. "...Okay, maybe I was pouting a little. But seriously, despite my shock at how expensive the arrows were, I don't regret my decision. Knowing what we're going to be up against, I wanted to make sure you never ran out of ammunition," he said, verbally stating the line he'd been repeating in his head ever since they'd left the fletcher's.

After purchasing his dagger and meeting back up with Samantha and Brian, Samantha had shown him a store she'd found with both high quality steel arrows, and the actual inventory they were looking to purchase. There were a few others that were cheaper, but none of them were capable of handing over the quantity of arrows he was looking for right then and there.

In the end, he bit the bullet and dropped another thirty-seven thousand shards. In exchange, he now had fifteen hundred, high-quality arrows safely tucked away within barrels in his Personal Rift.

Seeing as the merchant had promised and even demonstrated how they were crafted well enough to be reused essentially as many times as needed, he'd be impressed if Samantha managed to burn through all of them within the next ten years.

After that, Brian had convinced them to mess around on the level-spanning ziplines with him for a bit, and Asher had to admit they were a pretty insane method of getting around. Forget safety equipment or legal waivers, if people wanted a fast method of traveling from the third level to the fourth, they jumped on a zipline and shot downward. After experiencing the sheer speed those ziplines traveled for himself, Asher was astonished that the fourth level didn't have people dropping out of the sky to their deaths all over the place.

Once they'd finally tired themselves out, they grabbed dinner at the tavern and called it an early night. Part of Asher was tempted to head out under the cover of darkness and go assassin hunting, particularly after dropping so many shards on arrows, but he thought better of it. For one, the caravan was leaving first thing in the morning, and he wanted to be well rested in the event that they ran into any more roving bandits. Not to mention it seemed as though his identity within the city may have already been compromised. If one of this city's senior assassins had found him in the bath house, there was no guarantee they wouldn't make an attempt on their tavern room while they were supposed to be sleeping. And if anyone came for them during the night, he wanted to make sure he was there to protect Samantha and Brian.

Thankfully, the Awareness skill he'd borrowed from Brian's bracelet meant he could sleep soundly knowing that if anyone stared at their room for too long, he'd be notified. In the end, nobody had deigned to attack them, and they'd found themselves back in Brant's caravan and on the road once more before they knew it.

This time around, Brian didn't have Laura to play with. Instead, he was attempting to befriend the mogrant leading their wagon train. Before running off, he'd told them he was curious if he could get it to talk to him after seeing how Brant was always whispering to his own mogrant leading the caravan.

"Do you think we're making the right choice?" Samantha asked not for the first time, a slight frown on her face as she peered out the window at the passing terrain. "I know getting Brian to a safe location is our priority so we can fight without worry, but part of me wonders if delaying our attack on The Council of Death is smart. What if we make our way back to the tower, only to find that it's been emptied? We don't really have any other leads besides that."

"Don't forget, so long as I'm still alive, The Council of Death will come to us," Asher reminded her, putting a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "It's definitely less ideal than us getting the drop on them, but we'll find them one way or another."

"Let's just hope they don't come to us before we get Brian to the academy," she muttered, her frown deepening at the thought. Asher had already told her about his newly evolved resistance against scrying, but he knew what she meant.

There was no doubt in his mind that The Council of Death would have more direct means of finding him if need be.

In the few days since picking up his third evolved resistance, Asher had felt only one other attempt at his location being scried. Just like the previous time, the invisible pane only he seemed capable of seeing in the sky had shattered before it had even fully formed, letting him know the attempt had been thwarted. Whoever was trying to keep tabs on him must have decided any further attempts wouldn't be worth the effort, as he hadn't seen any more scrying panes since that last one.

"Brant said it was going to be a good few days before the caravan reached Poltar, right?" he asked, trying to word his request delicately. "I know you're worried about everything that's going on…"

"But not so worried I'll make you stay with me during the journey," Samantha said, cutting him off. Turning from the window, she laughed at the surprised look on his face. "Come on, you don't seriously think I don't know what's going through that battle-hungry head of yours by now, do you? Honestly, I'm surprised it took you this long to bring it up."

"I should have known," he smiled, scratching the back of his head sheepishly. "I spent most of my shards in the city, and with a few different skills nearing the level 20 cap, I have a lot I need to earn in not a lot of time. There's also the chance the Head might try to sic some of these assassins on us, so it's killing two birds with one stone."

"Or two assassins with one dagger," Samantha teased, poking him in the bandolier. "Seriously though, you don't need to convince me. I know better than anyone how important shards are. If we're in trouble, I'll give the signal. Though I can't say I find stabbing myself in the arm all that pleasant."

"I've been stabbed in far worse places," he argued, earning an eye roll.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

"And whose fault is that? Maybe if you weren't-"

The wagon they were sitting within exploded, and whatever Samantha was planning to say was lost in a maelstrom of whirling splinters. Despite the sudden chaos, strangely enough, there wasn't any sort of concussive force following the explosion of wood. So rather than get sent flying, Asher was merely sent tumbling to the ground.

"Samantha!" he shouted, shielding his eyes with an arm in an attempt to stop the jagged wooden chunks that once constituted their wagon from taking his vision. Already, his body was riddled with inch-long splinters flying every which way, and he was bleeding from what felt like dozens of wounds.

Still, whoever had attacked them, this was nothing compared to what Eight had put him through with his army of rats.

Trusting in Secret Seeker to help him search through the blinding storm of wood shards, he finally spotted Samantha.

Lying only a few feet away, and covered in far more injuries than he was.

With a roar, he Distorted over to her through the wooden maelstrom, ignoring the new wounds he took as he grabbed her and jumped into his Personal Rift. The sudden escape from the chaos of flying wood was jarring, but he didn't let that distract him. Without hesitating, he grabbed his last potion of Lesser Restoration and poured it down her throat. She'd be good as new in only a couple of seconds, but he wasn't planning on waiting that long.

Whoever had attacked them was still out there, and Brian wasn't far.

Making a mental note to have a pair of goggles commissioned at some point, Asher left his Personal Rift and immediately entered the astral. It was a dangerous choice, seeing as he'd need to ensure the area he ended up in was clear of flying wood before he risked returning, but he didn't have time to play it safe. Now that he didn't need to worry about protecting his eyes, he scanned the nearby area, looking for anyone that looked distinctly murderous.

In the end, they weren't very hard to find.

While the entire caravan had stopped and dozens of people had gotten out to point and gawk at the wagon that had been turned into a miniaturized tornado of wood shards, there was only one person at the far back of the train of wagons who appeared to be staring with a look of concentration on their face. And if that wasn't enough of a tell, the fact that their aura looked like a spiky, blood-soaked tree towering over them, Asher was more than a little confident he'd found his man.

Identify certainly didn't hurt either.

[Assassin] - 3/3 Elements

Not wasting any time, he darted forward, letting out a sigh of relief at the discovery that the wooden storm seemed fairly confined to where his wagon had been moments before. He also caught sight of Brant holding a screaming Brian back from rushing into the storm, which meant he was free to turn his full attention on their wannabe-killer. The moment he'd cleared the storm capable of shredding flesh, he returned to the material realm, not caring who saw him pop into existence out of nowhere.

The assassin clearly saw him, as the man's eyes widened and he jerked a hand forward, throwing a few large seeds onto the ground before him. Asher was only about a hundred feet away, and even as he went to start closing that distance in twenty foot chunks, he blinked as the seeds erupted into massive trees with remarkably thick branches.

What in the-

Asher barely managed to stop his Distortion and slip into the astral in time to dodge a powerful swing from one of the trees as he got near. Their branches whipped around with enough force to easily shatter bones, and their thick bodies blocked his line of sight to the assassin.

"Like hell you're getting away that easily," he grumbled, hopping back a few feet from the deadly forest that hadn't existed seconds before. Thankfully, with Distortion he was capable of covering ground far faster than most people, which meant rather than struggle his way through the living forest and potentially have his head knocked clean off, he had a second option.

Asher made his way around the patch of trees, happily sacrificing a couple of seconds as he prepared to continue his chase. But as soon as he'd cleared the edge of the skill-grown trees, he froze.

The assassin was gone.

Asher slowed to a stop, his daggers at the ready, but without a target to be stabbed into. The caravan as a whole had still been making its way down from the mountain when the assassin attacked, which meant they were traveling on fairly sparse terrain. There were a few scraggly trees here and there, but other than that, his assailant was nowhere to be found.

"Asher!" Brant called out, staying clear of the deadly trees as he jogged over to him. "What happened?"

"An assassin tried to take me out," he said, his eyes still slowly scanning the empty space between them and the mountainside leading back up to the city. "I think he had a Wood or a Tree element. Possibly both."

"I guess that would explain the destroyed wagon," Brant frowned, peering over his shoulder. "Did Samantha…"

"She's fine," Asher said, reaching into his rift and pulling her out. Samantha stumbled on the way out, but other than some minor disorientation, she was perfectly fine. She was covered in splotches of her own blood and her hunting leathers looked a bit worse for wear, but thankfully, it seemed as though she'd gotten away with only minor injuries that the potion he'd fed her had been easily able to fix.

"What… What happened?" Samantha blinked, looking between him and Brant. "One second we were talking, and the next… Everything exploded. I think I hit my head."

"An assassin came after us. And an experienced one at that, seeing as they knew not to look directly at our wagon," he frowned, wondering just how many senior assassins he was going to have to kill. "They summoned that patch of trees over there that will try and club you if you get too close, and then they vanished. Must have had some sort of teleportation skill."

"Is Brian okay?" Samantha asked, suddenly looking panicked as her brain-fog cleared up.

"I tossed him in my wagon and locked the door," Brant explained. "Lad's fine."

"Thank you," she sighed, suddenly looking far more furious than Asher had ever seen. Pulling her enchanted bow off her back, she tested the bowstring to ensure it hadn't been damaged, before nocking one of her brand new arrows.

"Uh… I know you're upset, but he's already gone," Asher said, taking a slight step back.

"Not yet. But he's about to be," Samantha snarled. Without any more explanation than that, the hunter brought her bow up, drew the arrow back, and let it fly in one single, smooth motion. Asher jumped as the clearly enchanted ammunition screamed past them, shooting off to the side of the path. The arrow pierced straight through one of the trees he'd noted earlier, splitting the wood and exiting out the other side.

Before he could ask what the hell she was doing, Asher gasped as the entire tree seemed to splinter and fall apart, revealing the assassin hidden within.

With a gaping hole directly in the center of his chest.

The man only had time to gape at Samantha, before letting out a cough of blood and crumbling to the ground. As the small violet orb of shards left his body, Samantha chuckled darkly as she lowered her bow.

"Trying to hide as a tree from someone with a Forest element was the wrong choice."

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