The hammer came again — and this time, Riven met it.
His blade didn't flinch. He drove it up in a brutal arc, not to deflect, but to split her wrist — missed by a breath. The head of the hammer grazed his shoulder, sending a sharp jolt through the muscle, but he didn't stagger.
He didn't back off.
Not anymore.
She felt it too. The moment the rhythm changed. Her brow furrowed.
But he just stepped in again — blade carving a tight line toward her throat. She twisted aside, grip shifting, and slammed the hammer low. He sidestepped, not having a second hand to block.
They split apart.
Circling.
Breathing hard.
Riven's legs ached. His ribs burned from that earlier hit. He checked on his qi. It pulsed low and unsteady in his dantian. The previous hours of exploring in the forest had left him almost dry. He barely had enough qi left for one use of Falconburst Kick.
He grit his teeth.
He needed to make this count.
But the chance wasn't there yet.
She adjusted her grip again, switching to a low stance — more grounded now. Her eyes were calm. Cold.
Riven stared at her, chest rising and falling.
And he couldn't help the thought that flickered unbidden through his mind:
Why did I ever think that hammer didn't suit her?
There was nothing elegant about it.
But she was.
Each movement honed like a weapon. Compact, focused, without waste. That hammer didn't just belong to her — it was an extension of her will. No wide arcs. No wild swings.
Every strike had a purpose.
Every strike wanted him dead.
Riven shifted his weight — blade low, knees bent. His heartbeat thudded in his ears, each beat a second lost.
He needed an opening.
So he could go all out.
He had to.
Even if it would leave him drained for a week.
He saw no other way to end this.
And then she gave it to him — the opening — without realizing.
She created space.
One step back. Wanting to breathe.
Just enough to adjust her stance. Just enough space to think. A safe second.
Or so she thought.
Riven moved.
His body blurred.
He reached for it.
That thing in his blood. The bloodline ability he hadn't used in a couple of weeks.
Extreme Speed.
The world seemed to snap into focus.
Time thinned. Sound vanished. Thoughts blurred.
The trees stopped swaying. Her hammer stopped rising.
Even her eyes — not realizing the situation — were too slow to blink.
He surged forward.
The seemingly safe distance crossed in an instance as his bloodline skill boosted his speed.
His blood started to burn as he bent low. Twisted hard.
Falconburst Kick.
Qi flooded his right leg — one final surge, sharp and immediate.
Now was the time.
His foot slammed into her ribs with the full force of his weight and momentum behind it.
CRACK!
Her eyes went wide.
Her body lifted, launched backward like a thrown rag — straight into the jagged outcropping of a dark stone behind her.
The crack echoed like a thunderclap.
Stone split. Blood sprayed.
Her body hit the rock spine with a sickening crunch — and impaled.
The outcropping cracked further from the impact — thin veins of fracture webbing through the stone like spider legs.
For a moment, there was only silence.
Then she slid slightly — still skewered — her head lolling forward, breathless.
Riven stood frozen, his blade still half-raised.
His mouth parted. No sound came out.
That… wasn't what he'd meant to do.
Yes, he'd fought to kill.
Yes, he'd gone all-in.
But this—?
A body pinned like meat on a spike. Blood trailing in thin lines down the fractured stone.
His heart pounded in his throat.
He took one slow step forward. Then another.
"I didn't…" he whispered. "I didn't mean—"
But he had.
He had meant to kill.
That was the part that stuck the worst.
Back in the dungeon, he'd refused. Chosen to let that murderer live.
Now, he'd killed someone whose name he didn't even know.
He felt cold.
Not from fear.
From the realization of how far he'd already fallen.
He took another slow step forward.
And the ground rumbled.
At first, he thought nothing of it.
Then the cracks widened.
A low, deep grind echoed from beneath the mossy floor — the kind of sound that didn't belong to rocks or trees.
What?
Riven was too occupied with his thoughts, not realizing that something was wrong in time.
The jagged stone — the one she'd been impaled on — shifted.
Then moved as if alive, throwing her body on the ground.
On the opening ground.
Her body was swallowed in a blink.
Riven staggered back.
The ground heaved upward.
From beneath the moss, roots tore loose. Soil spilled like blood.
Something enormous broke the surface — not stone.
Chitin.
Dark green. Polished like glass.
Legs rose from the earth like spears.
A second later, the forest split apart with a roar of tearing bark as a mantis dragged itself free — ten feet tall, armored in jagged plates, its head lined with barbed mandibles and gleaming compound eyes.
Its blade-arm extended outward — longer than a scythe, wider than a man's chest — dragging with it long strands of loam and black soil.
Clumps of earth dropped off in slow, heavy globs as the blade rose into the light.
Riven's eyes locked onto it.
His breath hitched.
They must have accidentally awoken something, they never should have touched.
This was no mere Lesser Feral.
The blade moved.
A flicker of motion, almost lazy.
But the next instant —
SHHHUNK!
The air screamed as the mantis's blade-arm shot forward like a ballista bolt —
Straight toward Riven.
He didn't even have time to react.