During those fateful days on Nekrom, for better or worse, Tristessa had learned that terror could come in different forms.

Terror of nightfall. Terror of the beasts that lurk in the darkness. Terror of the possibility of never recovering her memories. Terror of the possibility of never returning home…

Terror towards the unknown. One of the worst, and unfortunately the one she had encountered the most in that world of dark gods, angels and demons, monsters, and perpetual, invincible evil that came from the north.

One would think that the experience of dying and reviving had been the ultimate limit of what Tristessa had ever felt. All that isolating darkness that enveloped the soul and allowed nothing but despair and loneliness in…

But she had discovered one thing: there was no limit to the terror one could feel.

Whether it was the fear of the darkness, the fear of her loved ones dying, or the fear of being killed… No matter how many defenses one put up, how much determination cloaked one's heart… Terror was always there, waiting to take over and bring its victim to ruin.

"Ah…ah…" The girl inhaled and exhaled pure fear, her mouth trembling as her legs and hands, holding that knife and pointing it at the bandit in front of her. "…"

"What are you waiting for? Come at me, come on!" Katriel demanded, his vicious gaze brimming with confidence, as he threw one of her daggers into the air. He caught it without breaking eye contact. The whole situation seemed like a game to him. "After that, I'll let you…"

"Is that all you have?!" Reiden's scream overcame the calm, venomous voice of the bandit leader. It echoed through the trees surrounding the abandoned road, accompanied by the metallic sound of clashing weapons. "Curses!"

"How noisy… What were we talking about? Oh, yes! I said I'll let you attack first."

Katriel Strauss spread his arms, the two blades of his curved daggers gleaming in the reflected twin-moonlight. Leaving his torso exposed, free to receive any attack.

"And just so you know, my patience has its limits. So attack me now… Otherwise, you'll force me to come at you, and you won't like that."

That warning made Tristessa see a vile, corporeal shadow in place of that flesh-and-blood man dressed in black. Another source of terror that made her brain race, thinking in record time of ways to survive. Ways to not suffer anymore, to not feel the ghost of perdition looming over her, and to not die anymore.

"I don't want to die… I don't want to, but…" Also in her thoughts were those who were waiting for her and Reiden at Derelict Outpost. "For them, I have to do this… Move, coward!"

Angry with herself and with the cruelty of fate, Tristessa managed to find the courage to move her legs. By the time she realized what she was doing, she was already running toward the grinning criminal, with the clear and predictable intention of plunging the tip of her hunting dagger into his chest.

"…!"

Tristessa saw how Katriel Strauss only had to shift on his own axis to dodge her attack. Without being able to do anything to avoid it, she received a knee to the stomach, without mercy or restraint.

"Ugh…!"

Spitting saliva and coughing, she fell to the ground sideways, miraculously not harming herself with the dagger she never let go of. Her lower abdomen twisted, buckling under the stabbing pain, leaving her unable to move except to squirm. Her legs seemed made of rubber; they were unresponsive.

She was completely at the mercy of that bandit. Between watery eyes and strands of hair, she saw him bending at a 90-degree angle next to her so that she could see his face.

"Tell me, miss, how much do you think they'll give us for that old fart's life and yours?" he asked her, with genuine curiosity. "Is the old woman willing to hand over her wares, or do we have to kill them all and take them anyways?"

"Ah...p-please, no...!" Her pleas were in vain, amused by the man whose only interest was shedding blood and making a fortune by ruining the lives of others.

"Get up. Come on, try again."

Katriel distanced himself and continued playing with his daggers, giving Tristessa space to recover. Something that didn't seem like it would happen anytime soon: the bandit's counterattack kept hurting, the intensity constant, generating muscle contractions so strong they made it impossible for her to even stand up.

"Come on, move... MOVE, YOU USELESS BITCH!" she insulted herself, her face still covered in mud and her own saliva, feeling how cold the ground was that night. "Reiden's fighting and I'm here doing nothing...!"

"Here, take it." A small glass vial filled with bright red liquid clinked as it fell from the bandit leader's hand and rolled to a stop near her. "I hope this stops you from being so pathetic."

Glancing at first glance, thanks to the Twin Moons' illumination, it looked like a vitality potion.

"Fuck off..."

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Tristessa swatted the vial away from her sight, humiliated, and with what little pride she had not squandered yet. She then made a titanic effort to resist the pain in her stomach. Her legs began to respond. She rose from the ground, breathing with a mixture of harshness and fury, glaring at Katriel.

"Good, that's how I like it. If you'd taken that potion, you'd be dead by now. And not from the potion itself: I would have carved out your heart out of your chest myself," he commented, his irritable voice clear and with vile honestly. "Attack me!"

Although she couldn't run because of the condition of her aching abdomen, she walked as fast as she could toward Katriel and tried to stab him. Her thrusts never connected because of the way he moved, almost naturally, as if he were one with the wind. As if his eyes were designed to see perfectly in the dim light and avoid such attacks with ease.

"Uh… Grr!" Tristessa growled, filled with anger, even more so when she decided to change strategy and draw desperate arcs in front of her. Slashes that connected with air, and some of which Katriel intercepted for pure fun. "Yaaaa!"

"The blade facing outward and an upward motion, that's correct. A downward motion? No, that's wrong. Look how exposed you are… When is the right time to slash? When is the right time to stab?" the bandit asked, blocking the attacks and even using the momentum to deflect them to the sides. This not only left Tristessa in a bad position, but also left her absolutely open to a foul blow to the chest or face. "Decisions, decisions, oh how difficult…"

Every time Katriel's black metal daggers collided with hers, the vibration and the screeching sound made the bones in her fingers ache. Every time her dagger swung past, she stumbled and almost fell clumsily onto the dirt road. And it became increasingly difficult for her to breathe, not just because of the pain in her abdomen, but because she didn't coordinate her air exchanges well between attacks.

She was an absolute disaster as a beginner in the art of combat.

"Are you feeling more comfortable attacking? Are you a little more familiar with your weapon?" Katriel asked after blocking another attack and knocking Tristessa off balance, once again exposing herself from behind. Another mistake on her part due to the angle of attack that would have cost her her life. "All this time I've let you do whatever you want, I'm getting a little bored... It's my turn now!"

The bandit leader lunged at her in the blink of an eye and drew an inclined arc with the dagger in his right hand. Eyes wide open, Tristessa tried to dodge the blade by moving backward. Slowly. Very slowly. Or Katriel was very fast, too experienced, and he swerved with such speed that he managed to slice through her right forearm.

The fabric of her trench coat gave way, of her shirt too. And then skin and flesh gave way to the imperfect edge of the blade, causing Tristessa's scream to echo throughout the forest.

"Come on, come on, are you going to stop me or what?!" Katriel bellowed, laughing like a madman as the flurry of cuts descended on Tristessa. "DO SOMETHING OR YOU'LL DIE!"

But she was stunned. Every second that passed, a new cut opened on her body, on her arms, legs, at the sides between her ribs... Superficial wounds of torn skin and flesh that accumulated into a mountain of burning agony. As if dozens of red-hot steel rods were being driven beneath her skin.

She almost dropped her weapon as she her fingers going numb. Adrenaline was the only thing keeping her from collapsing and losing consciousness from all those wounds. And if Katriel hadn't been doing it on purpose, any deeper cuts would have wreaked havoc on her veins, arteries...

If he wanted to, he could have easily inflict wounds to make her bleed to Death.

"Tristessa!" Reiden shouted her name, pushing one of the bandits against the trees with his foot and blocking a thrust with his sword. He still couldn't break the stalemate between those four hostiles, and the exhaustion on his face was overwhelming. "Damn....! GET AWAY FROM HER!"

The mercenary couldn't bear to see Tristessa being tormented like that any longer, and he threw his parrying dagger at Katriel with excellent accuracy and speed. Katriel had to interrupt his attack and jump back to dodge the blade that flew in the direction of the Derelict Outpost, burying itself in the ground as it sank.

"Ugh…ah…"

Finally freed from the flurry, Tristessa took a couple of steps back. She kept trembling and dripping blood from all those multiple lacerations. So many wounds that the ferrous smell was almost as potent as the Discord that surrounded her by default.

It was a miracle she was still standing.

"What's your name? Tris—what…? Such a difficult name, I'll just call you Triss," Katriel asked, bringing the blood-stained blade of the dagger to her mouth and tasting a bit with the tip of her tongue. Then, a spit and a grimace of disgust. "Such a pungent dark soul… You've got to work on that footwork, Triss! Move in all directions and keep your poise! What balance can you expect to maintain if you stand there shaking like a leaf while being attacked?"

"S-shut up!"

Her nervous system washed her in incandescent flames, every inch of her body burning in extreme pain. Even in that condition, she staggered forward, attacking again uselessly with a thrust aimed at that mocking face. Katriel not only dodged her as if it were nothing, but she also made the same move as Reiden, kicking her in the back, causing her to crash headlong into a tree.

"Gah!"

"See how I used your momentum against yourself? It's a way to fight back, maybe the simplest one," he explained, chuckling as he saw the girl turn around, now also bleeding from a cut on her forehead. "You look a little angry. You should smile more, you know? You're a very pretty girl to have that nasty grimace."

"You're a…!" Her whisper was very weak, and she was forced to lean unto that tree behind her. She was starting to feel dizzy from the loss of blood. It was more than obvious that this was all slow torture. She was going to die, of that she had no doubt, and it terrified her to accept the cruel truth. "Damn you, Katriel Strauss…!"

At that moment, as Tristessa fell into despair, she heard the screams of the bandits, shocked by what had just happened: Reiden had slashed open the side of one of the bandits' neck by capitalizing on a positioning error. A spray of blood erupted from the impossible-to-close opening, and the criminal fell back to the ground, agonizing as he choked on his own blood.

One less member of the Ghost Daggers.

"Ah, damn it…" Katriel wailed, clicking his tongue and shaking his head with disappointment. "Zef, you idiot. Ludvig, try to keep your companions from dying, will you?!"

"Y-yes!"

The girl stared with half-closed eyes at the rapidly dying bandit, trying to cover the wound with his hands with what little consciousness he had left. Blood continued to seep through his fingers, extinguishing his life and causing a strange excitement to surge within Tristessa.

Watching that man take his last breath almost brought a smile to her face, for almost instantly she felt the pull of the abyss… From the black ocean of the spirit world, a wave expanded like a sonar, transmitting a dark call.

Dark karma creeping in. A parasite of immorality lodged itself in her dark soul from the moment she stopped seeing that man as a human being…

Now, in her gray eyes, that corpse was a tool.

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