Chapter 17: Thorn in the Mist

As soon as the 24-man squad heard PyroVex’s command, they moved automatically—battle-drilled, elite.

Tanks and melee surged to the front. Mages fell to the rear. Rangers fanned out for cover. Assassins slipped into stealth.

There was only one lone target.

The word buzzing in their minds was: Easy prey, despite the strange avatar.

Besides, seven of their squad had already reached level 10. Most of them wore guild-funded armor, enchanted trinkets, and weapons.

They were the best of the best in Red Fang.

They weren’t worried.

But they should’ve been.

The figure ahead—blurred, hooded, unreadable—raised one hand and cast lowly.

“Tabu spell: Mist-Devourer.”

Her words carried into the air and, as if on cue, a fog grew.

The sun vanished.

The intensity of her spell kept growing, swallowing the battlefield in a veil so thick they couldn’t see a meter ahead.

“What the fuck is this?” someone yelled.

Others tried to cast the Shatter spell to break the fog, but nothing worked.

Then came the screams.

“Aahh!”

“Glurg!”

“Dunst, no! Please, no! I give up!”

All around them, yells of distress, death, and panic rang out with no end in sight.

It was truly terrifying.

No spell effects. No warning circles. Just pain—bones breaking, lungs puncturing, metal groaning under pressure.

A man screamed as his chest caved in. Another howled as vines crushed his limbs, lifting him into the air like a puppet.

“SCATTER!” PyroVex roared, his voice cracking. “Get out of the fog! Regroup outside! DON’T PANIC—!”

Despite the command, they panicked and ran in all directions, hearts hammering, ears straining for any sound.

The elite Red Fang squad was no more—formation broken, all fleeing like children from death’s embrace.

Little did they know—that was the trap.

They were being hunted, and the hunter found it easy to pick them off one by one when they were isolated, half-blind, and afraid.

Everything was against them in the battlefield she orchestrated.

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Reddox, one of the top combatants of the guild, was more attuned to his reflexes.

As soon as he felt a prickle of danger, he leapt—barely dodging the first spell: a jagged spike erupting from the ground where his legs had been.

He dove again, panting, panic mounting with every dodge.

Is there no end to these spikes? Where is the caster—?!

A voice whispered behind him, low and mocking.

“What a clever little monkey…”

He spun in fright—too slow.

Vines lashed up from the mist, wrapping around his legs, arms, neck. He thrashed.

Then—shhk—a dozen stone spikes burst upward from beneath him, impaling him like a broken crown.

His scream died in a wet gurgle.

The blurred figure vanished back into the fog—a ghost wrapped in silence—as more shrieks echoed through the white veil.

Red Fang’s best were dying, and they couldn’t even find their killer.

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Six Remain

Not even ten minutes had passed, and only six had escaped the mist: PyroVex, Vectorice, and four others.

They stood shoulder-to-shoulder on bloodied grass, panting, weapons raised.

Mist licked the edges of their boots.

They watched the space within the fog grow quiet—signaling no one else from the team would make it out alive.

PyroVex clenched his teeth.

“Eyes sharp. Stay together. Don’t panic. Out here, there’s six of us—if we cover each other, we might stand a chance.”

Then—they saw her.

She strolled out of the fog like she was leaving a bathhouse.

Her movements were relaxed. Confident. Amused.

Head tilted slightly, as if studying them. Not fearing them.

Vectorice, the squad’s highest-level tank, raised his shield and roared, activating his taunt.

“STAY BACK, MONSTER! You want a fight—TAKE ME FIRST!”

The figure laughed.

“I’m not a beast,” she purred. “Aggro doesn’t work on me. But… if you want to die first—”

She raised both hands.

“Fireblade. Wind Torn.”

A vortex of spinning flame and air roared to life—blades of fire whirling like scythes in a hurricane.

The spell was terrifying—both elements feeding off each other in violent synergy.

Vectorice’s shield held the first three hits. The fourth pierced through. The fifth lifted him off the ground.

His scream was cut off as he slammed into a tree—and then jagged tree spikes skewered him before he even hit the dirt.

He gurgled up blood, hands trying to cover the gaping holes draining his HP.

Two mages behind him shouted in horror and raised their staves.

“Stone Wall!”

“Air Shield!”

Their spells held off the flaming vortex, but as it grew near, a translucent barrier wrapped around them—an ice shield.

Not theirs.

PyroVex’s.

It shielded them from the damage but left them reeling.

How could one of her spells take three of them to hold off? Was she human?

“You’re not used to fighting humans this strong, are you?”

The three mages, a swordswoman, and an assassin didn’t answer.

They steeled their hearts and charged at the blurred figure, despite the fear clawing at their chests.

The assassin slipped into stealth instantly—shadow melding into the curling mist.

He darted wide, circling to flank.

At the same time, the mages began a practiced tri-cast: one launched fire arrows, another cast strengthening buffs, and lastly, PyroVex cast his strongest spell:

Stone Dagger Rain—a flurry of rock shards erupting like knives from above, designed to limit movement and drag her attention upward.

She moved like smoke between the spells, deflecting some with swipes of raw wind, slipping past others like she could sense their paths before they flew.

The swordswoman charged through the chaos with a roar—feet pounding earth, blade humming with momentum.

Stolen story; please report.

Her high-speed dash cut through the haze like a comet, aimed directly for the figure’s torso.

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Blink Broken

Then it happened—all in one terrifying second.

The assassin faded into view, his dual daggers glinting with poison.

He went for her ribs and throat from behind—the classic Ghost Fang move.

At that exact moment, the mages finished their synchronized volley—fire, lightning, and spears of jagged ice fell like divine punishment from above.

It should’ve been the perfect kill.

But instead of dodging or shielding… something broke.

She cast Blink—and just as fast, forcefully canceled it.

The result?

Right at the last possible moment, the spell warped space around her—then collapsed.

She didn’t reappear meters away.

She reappeared one meter behind her starting point.

Precisely behind the assassin.

Not where the spell should have taken her.

Not where any opponent would expect.

The assassin’s blades sliced nothing but fog.

He staggered forward, unbalanced.

A sharp shove to his back—perfectly timed—sent him stumbling directly into the swordswoman’s swing.

Her speed rendered her powerless to stop the attack.

Steel meant for their enemy sank into his side instead.

He cried out in shock—but before they could react, a strong gust of wind followed, hurling both of them sideways like leaves in a hurricane, and pushing the incoming spells harmlessly past her.

And all the while, the hooded figure stood still, her expression unreadable, already shaping the next spell with lazy precision.

The assassin, even as pain erupted through him, understood what had happened.

She didn’t just cast Blink—she broke it.

She rewrote its path.

She used it as a fake-out to control the battlefield…

Dazed but alive, he rolled to rise—only for his finely tuned senses to feel the ground bulge a second too late.

Spikes erupted from below.

Jagged. Hungry.

They punched through his chest and gut, shattering his remaining HP.

The swordswoman, quicker on her feet, reacted to the wind’s momentum.

As she launched herself into a graceful backflip—her sword plunged into the dirt for balance—a smart move.

But in vain.

As the figure raised a hand, two words left her lips—calm, clear, final:

“Steel Web. Gravitational Pull.”

The swordswoman, mid-flip, never stood a chance.

One second she was airborne.

The next—

She was yanked backward, full-force, through the razor-fine lattice of mana thread.

It was like dragging flesh through a wireframe blender.

Her armor shrieked. Her limbs thrashed. Her scream died halfway through.

What hit the ground wasn’t a fighter.

It was pieces.

The mages looked on in horror.

Two backed away. The third—PyroVex—fired blindly, now in a panic.

But she—this hooded executioner—dodged the frenzied, weak attacks and countered with three swiftly cast spells of her own:

Wind Shear. Vine Bind. Flame Lash.

One mage exploded in a burst of flame.

The second mage’s ice shield shattered—then his body split by a howling blade of wind.

Lastly, PyroVex’s lower body was bound tight, mid-scream, realizing he was now alone in front of this devil.

They hadn’t just been outplayed.

They’d been outclassed.

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FINAL STAND

PyroVex, blood trickling down his face, teeth bared, screamed through pain and desperation.

“Who ARE you?! Why are you doing this?!”

She tilted her head, voice cold and amused.

“My client paid me to guard this pass. No one gets through unless I’m paid off.”

“How much?” he spat.

“Twenty thousand gold…”

PyroVex reeled, face pale.

“YOU’RE INSANE! Our entire guild treasury barely holds five thousand—”

“Then die where you stand,” she said softly, eyes glittering with strange, knowing light.

“Consider this a lesson in respecting tollkeepers.”

Now PyroVex stood all alone.

Bound limbs shaking.

Vision swimming.

Her spells weren’t just strong.

They were elegant.

Layered.

Like music.

Like a war poem.

He tried one last bluff.

“Wait!” he yelled. “I’m not lying! I can’t pay it all at once! Do you take world currency?”

The figure paused.

Then said simply:

“No.”

The final spike rose through his chest.

His body hit the grass with a dull, wet thud.

And his last thought wasn’t fear.

It was regret.

Why… was such a fiend sent against us?

The mist receded.

And the road was clean.

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WHITE CLAN

The guild White Clan crowded around a rented meeting hall, expressions sharp, excited, and smug.

Their second-in-command, Junto, slammed send to the other man’s account with a grin.

“Three thousand U.S. dollars. It’s sent. Done.”

PyroVex nodded smoothly, his expression blank.

“It’s worth every coin. The secret to passing by the hordes of beasts is stacking poison debuffs and working in teams of max ten. This way, you don’t trigger the power scale-up—

Stick together. Don’t cast early. Don’t resist the fear effect. Focus your tanks on—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Junto cut in. “We’ll brute-force it. Can’t be worse than the Harrow Maw dungeon.”

The White Clan cheered. They boarded their carriages like royalty.

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MIST GATE

The fog greeted them.

So did death.

Screams rang out from the mist like bells of doom.

Players who tried to fight were dismembered by unseen spells—blades of wind, crushing vines, and jagged spikes erupting from beneath their mounts.

One mage tried casting a counterspell and was silenced mid-syllable—his head cleaved by a whizzing water blade before the spell even formed.

Not one guild player was left alive.

The only way forward… was through death and respawning in town.

And standing before the wreckage?

Her.

The blurred figure.

Face unreadable. Hood low. Not moving.

Just watching.

As the smoke cleared, none of the White Clan lived to see the scene—just the lone player, who stood there and let the frightened NPC coachman pass by her.

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GUILD EARTH SPLITTERS HQ

“WHAT. THE. FUCK?!”

Master Duun slammed his gauntlet onto the war table.

“You said it was a poison debuff, PyroVex! You didn’t mention a goddamn PvP raid boss with infinite mana and zero cooldowns!”

PyroVex’s expression never changed.

“I didn’t lie. I sold you the information to pass. But can you blame me? A she-devil took root there. Latest report showed the mercenary and adventurer groups we sold info to—she let them pass unharmed.”

He scratched his beard.

“The toll and attacks are only meant for us.”

“Bullshit!” barked Sashara of the Golden Panthers.

“You sold us half the truth and none of the danger. Three of my top five are back in starter gear and down a level. You knew. You all knew!”

But PyroVex only gave a tired shrug.

No apology.

Just a sigh.

“Just as I know you know.

If you warn the others, they’ll wait and see.

But if you stay silent…

They’ll fall just like you did.”

Evening the playing field.

The man’s words were true.

At this point, all the guilds hoped their rivals ran into the blurred figure and lost just as much as they did.

And so, one guild after another entered the fog with false hope.

And each time, Blue butchered them.

No one left alive.

It was frightening.

And just enough to remind them who held the road.

And why silence was more profitable than truth.

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FINAL TOLL NEGOTIATION – DUSK

By evening, with every major guild bruised, broken, and equally humiliated, they met again.

This time, quieter. No more shouting.

Just hard eyes and clenched jaws.

The ten most powerful factions sat in a private conference room rented from an NPC merchant, lit by enchanted lanterns.

Nobody smiled.

Nobody mentioned the lie.

Nobody dared admit the real toll they’d paid.

Instead, PyroVex stepped forward and placed the combined payment rune on the table.

20,000 gold.

Then he mounted the next carriage.

At the edge of the mist, the blurred figure stepped aside as soon as she was handed the pay—without a word.

As the carriage rolled past, PyroVex dared one final question.

“Who are you really? Who paid you?”

A pause.

Then her voice—calm, low, and utterly without fear.

“I’m Thornblade.

And I sell silence.

Today, someone else bought yours.”

And behind them, Falkenhide’s gates opened.

Not in celebration.

In concession.

🌐 Global Player Forums – 00:28 a.m.

💬 @n0tArcane: There’s a boss-level chick killing the guilds… Devs cooked again. She smells like an inside player with boosted stats to hype action.

💬 @RunicSnail: My guild wiped instantly. We sent a complaint to the Devs, but they replied no rules or abnormality were broken or took place. I swear I'm quitting this game if more scary shit like that goes down.

💬 @hollowMirage: Rumor is some merc’s guarding the pass. Thornblade. Anyone heard of her?

💬 @_L00seLips: She’s not a player. No way. That’s a GM alt or rogue AI.

💬 @MopStains: She's hot as fuck I bet!!

💬 @grimTrigger: 10k gold to anyone who gets a screenshot of her face.