//Just had his info sitting in the drafts for 5 days without realizing it— That’s fixed now. Haha..

Planting a set of blades into the ground. Some are curved, some are jagged, and some are ridiculously large. Each is stained with blood, chipped from battle. All tell a story. “Mass grave complete. Rest uneasy.”

“…Oops— If it’s any consolation, your tongue work is pretty fucking amazing. Your secret practice paid off.”😇

“Dancing between the boundary of willingness and unwillingness sure does determine the amount of play you get, huh?”

Carving a good luck charm out of a piece of wood. It took the shape of a hatchet, a tiny model of the one his now deceased comrade used. He placed it upon the corpse’s forehead, shutting its eyes. A small prayer for a brave man.

“I don’t think I can trust anyone in the adventurer’s guild. Unlike the more disciplined headhunters, adventurers get weak in the knees at the very sight of a monster. Whether it’s fear, or a horny dog craving its superior. They’re liabilities, dead weight.”

Perhaps you ought to get to know your own body better before making stupid bets with him like this. It doesn’t take long to find your weaknesses. That gold you put on the line will be his soon at this rate.

This is the second loss now. One more, and you’ll be losing a lot more than gold. Your sanity should go first. Are you actually thinking this through, and training yourself before you meet with him again? Does he need to do the training instead? That’s what it’s coming to.

“Every week, you goad me into our usual game with that hefty coin purse of yours. What are you even doing to earn that much that fast? Well, I suppose it doesn’t matter. More importantly, aren’t you tired of losing to me? I guess you really do enjoy squirming.”

Tired, slightly stressed, and covered in dirt and dust. Wielders of earth magic are the worst. Like kids playing in a sand castle..or a stone castle.

“I don’t have anything to say about the new year. Congrats on staying alive, I guess.”

The streak continues. Bets are off the table. This has become a silly and sickening game of blatant harassment, spurred by empty instincts and an underlying resentment. You have something he doesn’t. Dignity, happiness, humanity. He’ll take them from you, little by little.

Rising from death, steel sky above. It was cheating, his survival. But everyone cheats. Everything cheats to live. Another job complete, a mountain of ash submerging his lower half. The target was huge, a titanic bird. This, too, is carried towards the steel sky by wind.