My thirst for righteous action was unquenched. Without the more esoteric defenses of ancient wizardly impeding our progress, the remaining cleanup lacked mortal peril. No other sufficiently powerful monster had chosen to habitate with the dragon. Purging this tower and patching the larger holes had brought some satisfaction, but I itched for more.

  That itch distracted me throughout our team bonding activities. Riena had elected to spend the night in the tower after our task was complete. Nyla took us to a branch room that had a metal sphere in the middle with its own dominant gravity. We lounged on soft metallic flowers as a fantasia of colors and sounds pulled a new tale from Fa?rie. It displayed the perspective of a sprite’s sensorium as she watched a noble high-elven knight free his princess from an evil unseelie sorcerer.

  By all accounts, the experience was magical, and the rest of the team rated it as one of their favorite film experiences. I made the polite noises and perfectly mimicked a regular human enjoying herself on an outing, but through the bond, they all knew I was both bored and annoyed. Instead of the normal anger and offense that most showed when they saw through my act, they felt pity. I… didn’t particularly care for that response either, but none of them were hurt by my feelings, so I let it slide.

  My irritation only grew as the journey home was uneventful. By the time we returned to Aspiration, all my senses were strained to their limit to detect a worthy foe. When I caught a whiff of highly concentrated necrotic MP, I peeled away from the team. “Go ahead without me, I’ll be quick.”

  Riena’s apprehension grew. “Mari… there is no reason to go alone. We—” She winced as a fraction of my aggravation settled on her.

  “Mari!” Casimir chided. “We only want to help you. There is no reason for that.”

  Red entered my vision. “Do not judge me on the secrets of my mind. A will of iron separates it from the world. Judge me by my deeds. For this hunt, I require no assistance. Yes, it may be wiser to arm myself with allies, but folly is the bedrock of adventure, the wellspring that grows all legends. As my need for mortal sustenance wanes, my heroic appetite waxes. Such a stomach is unsatisfied with chaff. It cannot fill me the way a meaty challenge would. Your help divides the portion and requires greater foes to sate me. I could not in good conscience endanger you so.”

  Vanya sorted. “Damn, you think that’s your conscience. Well!” She patted Riena’s shoulder. “Thanks for inviting me on your mission, but I’m going to bail before Mari explodes.” Before Riena could respond, Vanya walked away. Once she turned a corner, the Crafter sprinted away from our group until she was out of the bond.

  “My allies need not fear a sudden bout of madness. I would ask that you leave me to my labors.”

  Derek coughed. “Guys, Exemplar is a named hero. It’s not really our place to judge her methods or forms of recreation.”

  Casimir turned to him. “Our place? We’re a team. We look out for each other and step in when someone is being reckless.”

  “No. The named follow different rules and expectations. Mari’s been very lax with us, but we need to respect when one of humanity’s premiere defenders is putting her foot down. Riena’s authority as the Commander only extends so far. Exemplar won’t ignore her orders without cause, but no one will bat an eye if she does. If anything, Riena’s abilities will be questioned. That’s why Mari is asking to leave before forcing the issue.”

  “Lax? The hell are you on about?”

  Derek sighed. “She lets us call her ‘Mari’ instead of ‘Exemplar’. That privilege would normally be reserved for family. She asks us to use the equipment she makes instead of ordering us. We’re allowed to criticize her behavior, and she tends to listen. Most of the named I’ve worked with wouldn’t bother to explain their position to a regular hero.”

  “You are my battle companions, not rabble. Of course, I value your insight.” The red in my vision had faded slightly. “Please, do not fight me on this.”

  Riena took a steadying breath and ordered, “Make it back safely.”

  I nodded and left before my patience ran out. While I cared for all of them, I had a need.

  The trail took me to an open maintenance shaft that went down to an area above the catacombs. I hooked my Anytool around one of the ladders and rappelled down. It flowed around each rung as I descended. The MP concentration grew and mixed with the rot of decaying corpses. When I landed, teeth closed above me and acid poured from the walls. The illusion of stone and machines fell away and unveiled red cilia covered flesh.

  I switched to my Infernal set and carved out a square of tongue-stomach. A kick sent it to the middle of the room before I ignited the corpse and spread the fel flame to the walls. The chamber writhed in agony as I pulled some of the flames around myself to illuminate the way. More slashes with my envenomed blade created more ulcers and increased the spasms.

  Eventually, a sphincter opened and ejected more bile into the stomach. Using aura to increase my friction with the floor, I walked through the current and past the door before it closed behind me. This side was filled with fluid. I switched to my Oni Armor and pulled myself forward with ice-picks. My lungs burned with a need for air that I mitigated by willing the carbon dioxide back into oxygen. This drained my fatigue and created a pressing desire to cough as carbon dust filled my lungs, but it preserved me until my aura felt a high density of electrical senses to manipulate.

  Sensing things with your aura was indirect. With training, you knew what you could change, not what was where. With more training, it was effectively a sixth sense. Even with my expertise, it wasn’t perfect and the other five were more reliable, but for the purpose of detecting a brain through walls of flesh, it served.

  I conjured a spear of ice and shoved it through the wall with enough force that a shock wave rippled down both ends. Once secured, I hammered the spear with my fist until it was flush with the floor. The entire cavern shuddered once more and ceased as the brain died. Fluid drained as the flesh sagged and several valves opened. I hacked out black sludge and swallowed several delightful gulps of fresh air before continuing my descent.

  Such flesh constructions didn’t count as a monster. Any necrotically-aligned spellcaster could weave bone and sinew with the same finesse that a geomancer sculpts stone. Heroes seeking to slay them had to be prepared for organic traps.

  A stairwell appeared on my right side as one wall transmuted into viruses. I froze the vectors solid before switching armors and burning what was probably an airborne zombie virus. Necromancers loved creating self-replicating horrors.

  Down the stairs, I ran into an iris door of heavily enchanted steel. The pad next to it required precise biometrics to unlock. Rick’s, Gyro’s, or another Crafter? Regardless, a necromancer would have no trouble spoofing the lock. With a sigh, I climbed back up the stairs and carved a section of wall before descending again and carving a spoofing runic sequence.

  “Ooh, that looks fun,” Hunter chimed as I placed him in my imbuer. “Hmmmm, whatever you find down there will be good materials for my weapon.”

  “No solidarity among necromancers?” I asked.

  “That is not my purpose. Reanimation isn’t merely my calling, it is what I am. Speaking to you, caring for Coatlie, forming words: these are means to that state of being. I serve you willingly because you bring death. If you find me useful, then I can attain my purpose.”

  I could respect developing sapience as a means to an end. “Yes, the monster behind all of this should provide sufficient materials. I’ll need you ready for my Tuesday duel with Gabriel.”

  “I owe your mirror my thanks.”

  Once enchanted, I paced the square of flesh on the scanner and let it morph to the correct configuration. It perceived the machine as a body it was trying to infest and turned itself into a compatible organ. In this case, that meant the key to unlocking the door. When the door clicked open, the square giggled and burst into green flames.

  I stalked into the metal hallway. Warning signs littered the walls for both radiation and high-voltage. The floor vibrated with the hum of the nuclear generator for this tower of Aspiration. LED lights above flickered to life with my presence, and the floor was stained with black ichor. I crouched and examined several footprints through the gore. Another team has been through here.

  They better not have killed my—I let out a breath. It’s possible this is a rescue mission. I should hurry.

  My footfalls reverberated down the hall as I followed the tracks. They led to the converter station next to the reactor. Machines churned the volatile fission MP into more stable forms and a bit of electricity to power basic devices. Steam radiated from the floor, indicating a failing cooling system. The muggy heat was the perfect breeding ground for Flesh Horror sacks that exploded open in response to my presence.

  The creatures were a more advanced form of fodder undead than skeletons or zombies. Their nonviable biology was kludged together with necromancy, granting them greater speeds, unique adaptations, and all the robustness of their more simple brethren.

  This clutch had spider-like legs and a central ball of red flesh for a body. Their maws were a ring of misaligned teeth that covered an entire side of them. The creatures had no eyes, but they all faced me and spat acid.

  I dashed away from the globules and whipped my blade across the room to slash the nearest three. Poison laced up their veins from the removed legs, but none of the undead were bothered by the tier 3 enchantment.

  As I dodged and slashed, more eggs hatched and more legs scuttled through the mist. One of the creatures lunged from the ceiling and would have latched onto my head if I didn’t feel the displacement of air. I leaned back, grabbed a leg, and slammed the creature into another one attacking from the ground.

  I switched to my Oni armor and split my foes with walls of ice. They broke through them with one attack, but it slowed them down enough that I could punch through the nearest ones and rip them apart. My ice-weapons wouldn’t be useful against creatures this tough. A free-form ability like Ice Creation doesn’t make weapons the same tier as it.

  Despite eggs continuing to hatch, I made a steady headway through the press of bodies. This undisciplined mob couldn’t hope to touch me. No matter their numbers, wheat cannot overwhelm a farmer’s scythe.

  With all my strength, I clapped my hands. The resulting sonic boom shattered my ice constructs and sent frozen shrapnel into a regiment of flesh. That shocked my enemy long enough to grab one of the bigger ones by the maw and pull until it unraveled into a pile of organs.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  I laughed and spun to catch the double-bladed axe seeking to split my skull. “Ooh, a Deathknight. You would have caught most heroes with that sneak attack.” I twisted the blade away and stepped into its reach before palm striking the creature’s chest.

  He slammed into the wall and lost his helmet, revealing red hair and Chase’s face, Jeremiah’s Vanguard. “Ow. Come on, Exemplar. Is this anyway to treat a friend of a friend?” The Flesh horrors stilled with a gesture from the higher undead.

  I bounced an ice-blade on my shoulder. “I take it that the 2nd years necromancer hunt is going poorly.”

  Chase lumbered to his feet. “I don’t know, from my new perspective, we’re doing great!”

  “Worry not, Chase. I will put you to rest.”

  “Woah, hold on. There are Deathknight students. I can still help.”

  “Fine.” I jerked my head to the Flesh Horrors. “Prove your worth. Assist me with slaying these undead and their master.”

  He grimaced. “After Mother lays her egg, she promises to release me.”

  “Throw off the yoke and slay your master, hero. You either fight against your nature or humanity.”

  Chase hung his deathly pale head. The transition to unlife had left him relatively intact. There was a mortal wound somewhere on his body that would never heal, but it didn’t trouble him.

  “The chains that bind you are not so easily broken. That impossible effort is what makes those Deathknights heroes.”

  “But not humans, right? Never again human.” A green radiant mist flowed from his mouth. “Have you ever wondered why so many of us turn into monsters? I think it’s the shades. They aren’t human, so the more we grow in power, the easier it is to slip.”

  I waited for him to make a point.

  He laughed. “The most shade infected hero in the whole school doesn’t have anything to say to that?”

  “I don’t really care. As my frailties fade away, my humanity is more of an aesthetic than anything else.” More Flesh Horrors took positions around the room. “Enough stalling. Choose, monster: will you fight me or your chains.”

  “I’m not killing the one who brought me into this unlife!” Chase began to twirl with his axe. The movement became faster and faster until he was a whirlwind of death.

  “So be it.” I jumped and tossed my ice-blade at his head. Chase’s axe veered to collide with the ice and rent through the floor before he resumed his horizontal spinning.

  The Flesh Horrors then chose that moment to remount their assault. I kicked off the ceiling and dive tackled one to avoid a volley of acid. The horror and I rolled until I stood and tossed it into a clump of other horrors. I then resumed my previous tactic of conjuring walls and ripping apart monsters with my hands.

  Chase’s pursuing whirlwind added complexity to the task, but it also banished the concealing steam, making finding my targets easier. I also needed to manage Chase’s route. He always spun toward me, and would destroy any machinery that got in his way while sparing any monster.

  The dance was intricate enough that I let a few of the Flesh Horrors latch onto my ice-armor. They chewed and vomited acid, but my layers of defenses held until I could throw them off and smash them into paste.

  Eventually, the room cleared until it was just me and Chase. The man was a blur, moving at speeds I could never reach. I threw ice-daggers at him, and his axe shifted slightly to destroy the projectiles.

  “Exponential Momentum and Precise Strikes? That would be a devastating combo if you weren’t relying on a gimmick,” I said.

  The Vanguard continued to spin menacingly.

  “This probably got your team killed. You transform into an uncommunicative top that’s both slow and inflexible. With that kind of stubbornness, breaking free from your master should be trivial for you… No, you aren’t stubborn. You’re a coward. This is the tactic of someone terrified of dying. A lot of good that did you.”

  Trash talk was far more difficult when the other person couldn’t respond. I had no way of knowing if this got into his head or not. I conjured an ice-kusarigama and attempted to hook the ax-head. My weapon obliterated on contact. Chase could probably attain relativistic speeds if keeping him together didn’t strain his aura. Deathknights had boundless endurance, but their shades could grow weary from pushing their aura too far.

  I switched to my Infernal armor, tossed a corpse at Chase, and ignited it when he struck it. The flames entered the martial tornado and crawled up his arms before engulfing his face.

  He didn’t scream. He spun faster and retracted his aura to smother the flames with the wind pressure. I dove behind a column of machines as his firefighting efforts proved incredibly effective. Not only was the fire extinguished, his armor caught the air and flung in all directions, leaving his skin to burn like a meteor entering our atmosphere.

  Realizing his error, the Vanguard attempted to stop his spin and flung himself into a wall. Alarms blared as several critical machines failed and vented raw radiation into the room.

  Before the Deathknight could gather himself, I ripped the axe from his grasp and beheaded Jeremiah’s friend. “What a waste,” I lamented and collected the Deathknight’s armor and axe. Such materials would only result in completely cursed equipment, but if Gyro’s lesson on curse mitigation proved fruitful, it could be a way to make another mid tier set.

  The light of the atom warmed my skin as the radiation continued to spike. I found a terminal and logged the leak before continuing on. It took a lot of radiation to kill a hero. Our shades were uninhibited by it, and our aura instinctively disrupted the damage it would cause. Visible attacks from monsters still burned, but long-term effects were unheard of. My own regeneration left me particularly resilient, so I was unhurried as I entered the reactor.

  Blue Cherenkov radiation lit the pool as the control rods lowered with Jeremiah strapped to them. Every five seconds, he rewound his time to heal his burns and recover from drowning. The greater Bone Terror Nyla and I crossed on our way to our first class of Advanced Sparring was mounted above the pool. Her giant’s skull gazed at my fellow Crafter and drew life-force from him into her maw. The green wisps of essences pulsed down the creature’s red sinew and highlighted the worm coiled in her stomach.

  The creature had fused horns to her head and wrapped her torso in malleable flesh. Her two legs ended in hooks, forcing her to claw around on her massive eight fingered hands. Runes now etched every inch of her bones and glowed with the same green as Hunter. She jerked at my approach and bellowed a wave of death magic.

  I crouched behind my spirit-stone shield and pushed off the lingering effects with my aura. That could kill most teams. Perhaps I was too hard on Chase. I leapt for the creature’s skull. She leaned back and swiped at me with her hooked feet. I caught a hook and used the momentum to fling myself onto the Bone Terror’s back. The flesh opened into mouths that bit my feet, knees, and elbows. Other mouths then sucked in air as the creature prepared another death wail.

  Ripping out of the teeth sent several incisors through my armor and into my flesh. Eight kinds of zombie virus, a strand of mind controlling fungus, and flesh-eating bacteria festered in all the wounds as I kicked into the air and hid behind my shield from the second death spell. The force of the attack sent me to the ceiling. I ripped out one of the steel supports and hurled it at the monster.

  She buckled under the force of the attack and lost her next spell. The miscast sent bolts of green lightning arcing around the room and ripped through steel, concrete, and other important mechanisms. An alarm screamed as the reactor went through a perfectly safe automatic shutdown in response to the carnage. Jeremiah still struggled with the lingering heat and drowning.

  The Bone Terror spoke in the tongue of undead and more Flesh Horrors crawled into the room. These came in humanoid varieties with bone weapons and armor along with worm-like creatures covered in poisonous spines.

  I drank my last fortify health potion to better resist the Bone Terror’s diseases and dove shield-first toward her head. The creature pushed off her left hand to roll to the side. I whipped my blade out and latched onto her eye socket. She jerked her head and flung me around her face onto the back of her skull. There was no flesh to morph here, but the runes burst with death curses.

  Death effects pitted the strength of your shade against the will of the caster. They imposed the concept of ‘dead’ upon you. Fighting the curses off took a lot out of my stamina and nearly caused me to stumble. On instinct, I entered a rune-breaking sword-form and danced around the skull to mar the etchings. As the creature twisted, well-practiced steps kept me at the apex and swinging. My vision had darkened completely from fatigue, but my body continued to move.

  Once the threat was purged, I slumped and fell off the creature into the pool below. The fairly cold and radiation-free surface water shocked me out of my stupor, but not before the Bone Terror grabbed me in one of her hands and pulled me to her face. An ominous green glowed in those empty eyes as the creature prepared a death wail.

  I laughed and forced my limbs apart with all my strength. “Never grab a hero,” I spat before exploding the creature’s hand. As I fell, I collected one of the phalanges and threw it into the creature’s eye before latching into the other socket with my blade. This time I pulled myself into the creature’s skull and rolled in. The abyss of her mind seeped into me and poured every ounce of hatred she had for the living. Most of my capillaries burst and a pain in my eyes signaled blindness. The world fell quiet, and my skin was numb.

  While hacking blood, I jumped and ping-ponged myself around the skull. My aura could manipulate the resonant frequency of the bone structure. That information provided the clues I needed to adjust my collisions to increase the vibrations of her head. With most of my senses crippled or dampened, time was difficult to measure. It felt like hours; it was probably seconds.

  I didn’t notice the skull flying apart until my body rolled through several Flesh Horrors. After switching to my Oni armor and freezing the monsters around me, I drank a berserker potion and lost myself to the frenzy.

  By the time I came to, the reactor room was littered with frozen weapons and pulped Flesh Horrors. My vision was hazy and the rest of my senses had recovered to significantly below standard human sensitivity. Should be fine after a good night’s recovery.

  With an ice-chain and hook, I cut Jeremiah’s bonds and pulled his body back to the surface. Once free of the water, his screaming filled the room. I left the basically immortal student on the ground and harvested the Bone Terror’s parts. The skull was severely marred but was still the most MP rich. The horns were interesting. They appeared to be a mix of several differently aligned demons, even celestial. That didn’t compare to the rich find of a natal Bone Terror in the torso. The creature had ‘ceased’ its unlife with the mother, leaving a corpse made of a rare form of solid abyssal matter, which was a great material for facilitating self-moving necrotic weapons.

  During the scavenging, I smashed any twitching parts. Bone Terrors were never truly destroyed or killed. With enough damage, they became nonviable and couldn’t reconstitute on their own.

  Mari, are you okay? Coatlie asked inside my mind.

  “What a glorious victory! The cost was terrible, but I am lucky to remain hale,” I responded.

  She squeezed my neck. You could have easily died there.

  I know! That was the point. I wouldn’t explain that aloud where Jeremiah could hear. It wasn’t very tactful to boast how great the fight was after so many other heroic deaths. When I returned to him, the man had composed himself with his hands on his chest and stared up at the ceiling.

  At my approach, his eyes shifted to me. “Hello, you must be Exemplar, I’ve read a lot about you.”

  “Ha!” I fought to control my mirth. All my muscles were loose and every step was lighter. “A fine jest.” I extended a bloodsoaked hand to him. “I can forgive your sense of humor after such an ordeal. Continuous torture of that magnitude has broken many heroes. How long were you trapped?”

  He accepted my hand and gingerly rose to his feet. “I have no idea. I’m Jeremiah’s emergency partition. I take over as a fail-safe while he pulls himself back together.”

  “Jeremiah made a tulpa? I’ve looked into the old Tibetan Buddhist practices, but I failed to conjure a thought-form that wasn’t exactly like me. I think my ability interfered in the process.” A complete waste of time, really. Right. Where did that thought come from? Eh, probably not important.

  “Not really. I’m a fairly flat personality and don’t have most of his memories. My experience consists of mainly reading updates from him and piloting the body back to a safe place so that Jeremiah can fall apart there. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night for an hour. I take those opportunities to play video games and move his things around.”

  I snorted at his pranks before grimacing. “In all likelihood, his entire team is dead unless he and Chase did this by themselves. Your dorm may no longer be a safe place.”

  Sort-of Jeremiah shrugged. “Maybe they did; I didn’t really know Chase. He and I chatted a couple of times, and the guy seemed alright. I’ll check our dorm. If that’s empty, then I’ll crash with an overprotective ex. Jeremiah ended things because she was too clingy, but I thought she was nice...” He looked around. “Hey, could you help me out of here? I don’t know how to fight.”

  I placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. “I would be honored, but first we need to get you blooded. Any part of my friend should know how to slay monsters. I’m sure a Flesh Horror or two is hidden nearby.”

  “Oh dear.”

  voluntarily kidnaped by a team of monster magical girls and gets asked to join them. ("No, totes, Ezzen. You can totally be the guy in the chair. I swear. No pressure.").