Dawn painted the eastern sky in pale orange as I met Lena and Bren at Crossroads Watch's east gate. Lena had a map spread on a barrel, her finger tracing the route to the Old Iron Mine.
"The job's straightforward," she said, her voice all business. "Thirty bandits, each one a professional killer with a price on his head."
I blinked. "The notice said Cave Fishers."
"Noticed you can read." Lena grinned. "The monster job paid one gold. The bandit job pays five. Per head. There's a wanted poster inside for a crew calling themselves the Rust Axes. They've been hitting caravans between here and the pass for months. The guild's been hiring exterminators quietly. We're exterminators."
Bren shifted his massive shield, his expression unchanged. "You said you could do control. Cave Fishers or bandits—control is control."
I should have walked away. I was a half-healed specialist with a fractured core, facing professional killers. But five gold. That was the Academy fee and travel money and supplies for months.
"Tell me about them."
Lena's eyes lit up. She knew she had me. "The Rust Axes. Fifteen to twenty fighters, led by a man called Hewn. He's a deserter from some northern mercenary company, C-rank Warrior with a battleaxe that's supposedly enchanted to never dull. They've got a mage too—Sorrel, E-rank, uses some kind of sticky Web spell to trap wagons. That's where you come in."
"Countering the web?"
"Making it ours." Lena's grin sharpened. "Sorrel's web is alchemical—a resin that hardens on contact. You can't burn it, can't cut it easily. But if it's plant-based... you said you talk to plants. Can you talk to alchemical spider-snot?"
I thought about Verdant Sovereign's Touch. Its analytical function could read biological compounds. If the web had organic components, I might be able to... not command it, but confuse it. Trigger premature degradation. Or if it was truly plant-derived, perhaps even repurpose it.
"I can try," I said. "No promises. My mana pool isn't what it should be."
"We'll keep them off you," Bren said, the first words he'd spoken. His voice was deep, steady. A wall you could trust.
We moved out within the hour. The trail led east, into rocky hills dotted with stunted pines. Lena scouted ahead, her movements economical and silent. Bren stayed with me, a mountain of patient steel.
"The mine's their base," Lena reported after an hour. "Old excavation, collapsed in places. They've got watch posts on the ridges. We go in at dusk, use the shadows."
I spent the walk preparing. I gathered handfuls of Stinger Moss from the rocks—a common lichen that released irritating spores when crushed. I found a patch of Crack-Cap fungi, small mushrooms that popped with a loud report when stepped on. Using the barest whisper of my skill, I enhanced their properties slightly—more spores, louder pops. Then I stored them carefully in my pouches.
Lena watched with raised eyebrows. "You're making... what, exactly?"
"Diversions. Alarms. Area denial." I shrugged. "I can't throw fireballs. I can make the ground argue with you."
"Huh." She looked at me with new respect. "That's almost better."
We reached the ridge above the mine as the sun touched the horizon. Below, a collapsed stone building marked the entrance. Fires flickered inside. Figures moved—too many to count.
"Twenty-three," Lena whispered, her eyes sharper than mine. "Two on watch at the entrance. Hewn will be in the back, in the old ore office. Sorrel somewhere in the middle."
The plan was simple: Lena would take out the sentries silently. Bren would draw the main force. I would cause chaos—spore clouds, popping fungi, and if I could manage it, turn Sorrel's webs against their owners.
It was a terrible plan. But it was all we had.
We crept down as darkness thickened. Lena vanished into the shadows. A minute later, one sentry slumped silently. The second followed before he could cry out.
Bren moved then, not silently at all. He walked straight to the mine entrance, raised his shield, and slammed it against the stone wall. The boom echoed like thunder.
"RUST AXES!" he bellowed. "Your mother sends her regards! She wants the child support!"
Chaos erupted. Bandits poured out, weapons drawn, roaring curses. Bren planted himself like a rock in a river, his shield absorbing blows as he swung his mace in devastating arcs.
I moved through the shadows on the flank. My heart hammered, but my hands were steady. I found a patch of dirt near the entrance where the bandits were gathering and scattered the Stinger Moss. A pulse of intent: "Wake up. Be angry."
The moss released its spores in a thick, grey cloud. Bandits coughed, eyes watering, stumbling back. One fell, clawing at his throat.
A woman's voice screamed from inside. "What is this? WHO—" A shimmering strand of pale resin shot from the darkness, aimed at Bren's legs.
Sorrel's web.
I was already moving. I dove into the entrance tunnel, ignoring the stench of unwashed bodies and old rot. I saw her—a thin woman in stained robes, her hands glowing as she shaped another strand.
I focused on the web already forming. My skill's analytical function kicked in: Organic resin, plant-derived base (sap from Ironbark trees), alchemically modified for rapid hardening. Partial living component—dormant cellular structure.
I could work with dormant.
I pushed a thread of intent into the hardening web: *"Remember being alive. Remember growing. Forget what she made you." *
The web, halfway between liquid and solid, shuddered. Sorrel's eyes widened as her spell collapsed, the resin turning brittle and crumbling to dust.
"What—WHO ARE YOU?"
I didn't answer. I threw a Crack-Cap at her feet. It popped, loud as a gunshot, and she shrieked, stumbling back. Another pulse of intent: the Ironbark sap barrels behind her. *"Grow. Now. Through the cracks." *
The barrels groaned. Roots—thin, desperate, alive—burst through the wood, spreading across the floor. Sorrel slipped, fell, and was tangled in moments.
I turned and ran back to the entrance. Bren was holding, but barely. Blood streaked his arms. Lena had appeared on the ridge above, picking off bandits with precise shots.
But there—a massive figure emerging from the mine's depths. Hewn. His axe gleamed with an unnatural sheen, and his eyes locked onto Bren with murderous intent.
I had nothing left. My core throbbed in warning. One more significant use of my skill and I'd collapse.
But I had the fungi. I had the moss. And I had one more trick.
I scattered everything remaining at the entrance—spores, popping caps, fragments of enhanced lichen. Then I pushed the last dregs of my will into the earth itself, not to command, but to amplify: *"Every step. Every breath. Make them regret it." *
Hewn charged. His first step into the entrance triggered three popping caps. He ignored them. The second step kicked up a cloud of spore dust. He coughed, slowed. The third step—the ground beneath him, saturated with my intent, seemed to soften. Not much. Just enough to throw his balance.
Bren's mace caught him in the ribs as he stumbled. Lena's arrow took him in the shoulder. He roared, swinging wildly, but the fight was broken.
Ten minutes later, it was over. Hewn bled out in the dirt. Sorrel was tied with her own failed web. Seventeen bandits dead, four captured. The rest fled into the night.
I sat against a rock, my head spinning, my core a dull ache. Lena approached, her face smudged with dirt and blood, but her eyes shining.
"Kid." She crouched beside me. "That was... I don't know what that was. But it worked. You okay?"
"Need... to rest," I managed.
She nodded, then pressed something into my hand. A leather pouch, heavy with coin. "Your share. Five gold, plus a bonus from the guild for the mage alive. You earned it."
I opened the pouch. Gold glinted in the dying light.
Five gold. More than enough.
The road to the Academy was open.