Jack awoke to lantern light.

  Every fiber and cell in his body resisted the call to consciousness. His left foot was numb, and his back and arms felt like they’d been infused with lead. A fog deeper and darker than the shroud nearby thickened his thoughts, making them molasses.

  Where… Where am I?

  The question—like his consciousness—remained frustratingly out of his reach.

  What’s going on? Why do I feel like an 18-wheeler used my body to stress test each of its wheels?

  Jack groaned, tasting dirt and dried blood on his lips.

  Is Tony gone? Is it over? Hell, that was the worst beating I’ve had in years.

  Distantly, he was aware that it was dark. No sunlight baked his skin. Hesitantly, he opened his eyes, hoping his surroundings might offer some clues as to his addled state. In place of the sun was the shivering light of a lantern held aloft by a long pole. Someone, or several someones, were standing atop a rampart near his location.

  He stilled. Some part of his mind knew that to move was to die.

  He felt a surreal warmth spreading from his chest and throughout his body.

  How long has that warmth been going? Jack idly wondered. It felt good, but at the same time, it felt like he was being drained of something vital.

  More of his vision returned, and spotted several silhouettes above him framed in the tall grass that mostly obscured his sight. They were looking for something.

  Sound returned with a painful POP in the back of his ears, and he could hear muttered curses and whispers as the lantern swept over the wall and across the field he was in. The searchers were each in various shades of red armor…

  Then it all came back.

  Tony.

  The white chains.

  Steward.

  The shroud.

  Orcs.

  Derrick.

  Myrtle.

  Death.

  Death…

  DEATH.

  Jack struggled to breathe. It was all too much. He could smell the dried blood of orc and man staining his linen tunic and brown pants, and bare feet.

  That’s right. I gave my shoes to Myrtle, who gave them to some poor kid named Matthew.

  The lantern flickered in its glass casing, and the pole moved it to another section of the long grass field. He let out his breath, long and slow, and slowly—slowly—returned to himself. Jack assessed his situation as objectively as he could.

  I’m wounded and need medical attention. Barring that, I need one of those healing potions. I’m not in the shroud, so the title boosts to my Constitution aren’t active right now. I can feel my body mending, but it’s too slow. I… I think I have a fever. Shit, is there any sort of concept of germs in this world?

  He thought back to Myrtle.

  I need more answers. But based on what those knights were saying, I’m a wanted man right now.

  This thought sent his mind through a cascade of inferences. He couldn’t be sure about any of his assumptions just yet, but thought they were safe to run off for now.

  This is a world of magic, not technology. That means no security feeds. Only Derrick knows my face, but it was already banged up and covered in orc blood. Barnaby saw me, but it was only for a little bit. Lori got the closest, but she’s dead. Sathem might know my name, but didn’t get a good look at my face. If I get new clothes and avoid this section of town, I might be able to sneak in and find a place to settle into.

  He cursed.

  No, that’s not going to work. It’s just too damn risky right now. I don’t know SO MUCH!

  He stared up defiantly at the sky.

  “You really couldn’t have given me a freaking tutorial, could you, Steward?” Jack spat.

  His anger felt good. It warmed him, giving him the energy he needed to shift to his side. The moment he did, he felt a fresh wave of pain and nausea erupt inside of him. He finished twisting over and vomited what little remained in his stomach.

  When it was done, he spat and wiped his face.

  His Constitution was getting a workout.

  “I’m not going to die here. You hear me, Steward? I don’t care what your game is. I’m going to figure this place out, beat the hell out of the darkness stuff, and then find you.” Jack shook his head, feeling that old anger turn his attitude to flint. “I’m going to find you, Steward. And when I do, we’re going to have a freaking reckoning.”

  He glared up at the starry sky above him.

  “Bet on it.”

  His chest warmed, and he noticed that his tunic was glowing slightly. Curious, he rocked back onto his heels and lifted up his shirt. There, emblazoned on his chest, was a dimming tattoo of incredible intricacy. Each line bled light. And in the darkness of the night, it briefly blinded him.

  “Shit!” he hissed, and immediately turned over so that the guards patrolling the nearby ramparts wouldn’t see a random section of the grass light up.

  He disregarded his pain and lay, chest down, in the muddy soil. He waited there, breathless.

  Overhead, Jack heard several pair of boots pass by.

  Come on. Come on!

  If they spotted him now, he was a dead man.

  He continued to wait there in the mud.

  After nearly ten minutes, he felt a shift in the luminosity emanating from his chest. Cautiously, he twisted around, testing how much light was still coming from his torso. Thankfully, it was a bare trickle to what it had been before.

  He pulled his shift back further, hoping to gauge what this strange glowing symbol was.

  But even as he watched, it dimmed back to a black ink. Even through the bruises and odd angle, he gathered what his new tattoo was.

  A shield of light slamming against a wall of shadows. The detail work was so precise and clean, he knew that to get this sort of thing back on Earth would’ve easily cost over a grand, if not more. It was peerless, and it was definitely not his.

  “What the hell?” Jack whispered, rubbing at the design.

  It didn’t come off.

  The last of its light faded, and he was left feeling both warm and unnerved.

  “When did I get that?” he asked no one in particular.

  Shrugging his tunic back down, he took another deep breath.

  “Well…” He glanced back at the ramparts and the town it protected. “I’m not going back there right now. But the Lord knows I need a place to rest and heal up.”

  Jack scanned the night, looking for any clues or places he could hole up. He rubbed at his eyes and squinted. Off in the distance, he thought he could barely see a tiny flame. It moved and flickered across the horizon, illuminating what might be a building.

  Praying it wasn’t another patrol, he got to his feet and began to make his way in that direction. It was perpendicular to the wall behind him, so he hoped it would mean someone other than one of the Red Knights.

  “I’ll hide and check them out before I approach,” Jack decided.

  It felt good to speak his intentions out loud. He knew most of his coworkers thought it made him sound crazy, but there was something about speaking his thoughts aloud that calmed and centered him. He did it all the time when working on engines, reciting the steps and tools, and techniques under his breath as he worked.

  Jack stumbled forward, trying to put as little weight on his left foot as possible. His limping gait still sent shots of pain up through his spine with every step, reminding him of each bruise and cut across his body. But as always, Jack pressed forward.

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  He stepped through the tall grass, occasionally planting his feet in muddy soil. It was particularly bad when it happened on his bad foot, as he had to grab his thigh and rip the appendage out of the clingy earth. He gritted his teeth, cursed, but kept pressing forward.

  That was bad enough. It worsened considerably when he hit the farmlands. He could spot what had to be a grain of some kind, and then corn-like stock growing taller than he was.

  It was here that he lost sight of the light nearly a dozen times as he slowly shambled onward. He was pretty sure he was walking in a straight line, but as the crops didn’t always allow that, nor did he have the strength to pioneer a totally fresh path through them, he had to weave and wind his way through.

  The torchlight started to move again when he was less than a half-mile out. Whoever was holding it turned once, and then the light went out.

  “No!” Jack hissed, trying to pick up his pace.

  But it was useless. The world returned to darkness, lit only by the stars and a thin sliver of the moon above. He cursed, punching one of the corn-like husks in his frustration. He’d been so close. But now, without the light to guide the way, he had no doubt he’d get turned around. He was fairly certain he remembered the direction of the torch, but knew one wrong turn would send him in a random path.

  “No,” Jack sighed, feeling utterly and completely alone.

  He clenched and relaxed his fists, half expecting his fresh tattoo to conveniently illuminate his environment. It remained frustratingly dormant. What little warmth he’d gathered by moving was robbed from his bones as a breeze swept across him. He started to shiver. Clearly, his Constitution or Resilience were not up to staving off the cold. Not yet, anyway.

  Like before, he eventually took refuge in talking through his problem.

  “Fine. No torchlight.” He glanced up at the stars and scoffed to himself. “Yeah, there’s no way in hell that I’m going to navigate with those.”

  He shifted his gaze toward the shroud, which blended with the nighttime save for the notable lack of stars.

  “Okay, where was the shroud when I was walking the right way?”

  Jack scrunched up his eyes in concentration. He forced his fatigued mind to recall where it had been in relation to the light. It took him longer than he would’ve liked, but he recalled finding the torchlight after unsticking his foot just a few minutes ago. He’d glanced at the shroud and used its blank blackness to contrast the light.

  “That way,” Jack decided, feeling more sure of himself this time. It was close to the route he’d been walking, but now he had an anchor to navigate with.

  Moving slowly, it took him nearly an hour to exit the fields of crops. When he did, he stumbled onto closely cropped grass that preceded a tall fence.

  “Damn it!” Jack said.

  He couldn’t climb a fence in his condition. Still, he knew his strength and knew that it was waning into dangerous levels. His shivering was getting worse, and the chills he knew came from a fever started to sweep over his body. He didn’t have long.

  Jack was just about to start up the fence anyway, damn the consequences, when he caught movement to his left. A figure was already starting up the fence. It was hard to tell in the dim light of the evening, but he thought he could just barely make out gray skin and tusks protruding from the figure’s lower lip.

  “An orc. Really?” he whispered, not sure which cosmic force he was blaming for this turn of events.

  Cursing at his rotten luck, Jack stumbled in the orc’s direction. He tried to move stealthily, hoping to ambush and make quick work of the monster, but he was just too tired. His foot caught on a root, and he fell hard to the ground. The wind was knocked out of him.

  He groaned, trying to roll to his feet, but his body was just too sluggish. He unearthed his foot, and it was only then scraping it from its organic vice, that he noticed the veins.

  There were nearly a dozen black spots encasing his left foot and ankle. And from each of them, thin veins were spreading up his leg.

  Sathem, Jack realized, a growing horror knotting in his gut. His root attack. It was… poisonous.

  No wonder he was so feverish, and his Constitution was struggling to keep up. He was poisoned!

  He forced himself to look up. It was a good thing he did, as he just caught sight of the small orc drop from the fence and stalk toward him. The glint of a long and crooked dagger caught the starlight.

  This orc was significantly smaller than the previous ones he’d seen, and wore a smattering of black mud or paint across its eyes. With the cowl it wore over its head, and the blade held in a reverse grip, it didn’t matter how slight this monster was. In that moment, it was a nightmare come to life.

  Jack coughed, and tasted iron. Still, he rose to his feet.

  “You trying to sneak onto the farm too, buddy?” he wheezed, pulling his numb fists up to a boxing stance. “Well, you’ll have to get in line. Ain’t no way I’m going to bunk with you tonight.”

  What am I saying?! Some non-delirious part of Jack’s mind was screaming.

  He ignored it.

  “Kulgeth-ek, thrakul, zul ‘ak kro zul kro-grakhul vorthul lakh-nokh gralkulak-ol!” the orc hissed at him. Its voice had an oddly nasal timber to it.

  “You… You sound like Squidward,” Jack said, and he pointed a finger at the creature. “Stupid Squidward orc. Squidorc! Nope… That’s dumb.”

  The orc growled deep in its throat in a decidedly not Squidward fashion. It began to back toward the fence, clearly looking like it wanted to scamper over it. At a closer glance, every section of the fence glowed a dull blue save for the area where he’d spotted the orc. This part was either special, or maybe some defense was deactivated in this spot.

  Like glacial puzzle pieces, certain details started to slide together in Jack’s addled mind. This creature was small. Agile. It was cloaked and obscuring its face here in the middle of the night. That meant it had to be here to either assassinate whoever was in that farmhouse, or was a scout of some kind.

  Regardless, it was here to kill, or help its detestable kind kill.

  That simply wouldn’t do.

  “No. I won’t let you,” Jack said.

  Moving with every ounce of his remaining strength, he shifted so that he stood in front of the deactivated section. The orc hissed and bit at the air, exposing its row of incisors and lower tusks. Jack didn’t falter.

  The monster lunged. In the shadows, Jack could barely see its limbs, so he let his instincts take over. Its blade rushed forward, aimed to disembowel Jack. He didn’t wait to find out if it would be successful. Instead, he kicked forward in what was famously dubbed a Spartan Kick. His bare heel caught the creature’s wrist instead of its sternum, but it had the intended effect. It flew backward, crashing onto its face.

  Jack, however, lost his balance, and fell hard against the fence behind him. The small of his neck collided with one of the horizontal logs, and he saw stars.

  There was a roar, and the orc was back on its feet and dashing toward him again. He rolled his back off the fence, and lashed out at the orc. He was too slow. Its blade burst into flames and stabbed into his gut.

  Jack roared with pain and he doubled over. The nauseating scent of his own burning flesh permeated his nostrils, and bile rose in his throat. The monster made to unsheathe the dagger from his insides, but Jack’s hand moved on sheer, bloody, overdrive. It caught the orc’s wrist and he put every ounce of hatred and desperation into that squeeze.

  He heard half a dozen bones snap under his grip, and the orc’s right hand fell away to hang limply at its side. With his free hand, he gripped the hilt of the flaming dagger.

  All the stars overhead were blinking out. More blood seeped between his clenched teeth.

  “Not.”

  Jack grabbed the hilt and pulled.

  “Like.”

  He was going to die. He knew that now. But he could, at the very least, ensure that whoever lived in that house would not meet the same gruesome end he was about to.

  “THIS!” Jack shouted.

  He felt something click inside his chest, like a switch getting thrown as some hidden criteria was met. Power flooded his mind, his muscles, his very soul.

  [Congratulations! Through effort, your skill, Relentless Spirit, has leveled up!]

  [Relentless Spirit: Level 1?2. Rank: Novice]

  In the tsunami of energy, he felt something inside of him crack under the pressure. The power morphed, and he felt his mind brush against something foreign. It was light and warmth and…

  Fire.

  Jack didn’t think. With all the poison, pain, and adrenaline, he couldn’t. Instead, like the drowning man he was, he yanked on whatever lifeline he could find. And so Jack pulled on this fledgling connection with that power with every bit of his newfound strength.

  Blood dripped down his stomach, dyeing his shirt black in the darkness of night. The orc slashed at him with its left claws. Jack let go of the dagger, which continued to simmer and gurgle with flames inside of him.

  It didn’t matter. All that mattered was that this monster died now.

  Jack caught the second wrist of the orc, but something was different. That power he’d called on, it had flown through his veins, extending from deep inside his gut and traveling through his arm and into his fingertips.

  Exploding with a power he couldn’t not explain, his finger burst into flames as he caught the monster’s arm. It’s oil cowl lit instantly from the fire that licked up its limb. Jack didn’t let go. He wasn’t sure he could. The flames wreathing his hand did not harm him in the slightest, but the same could not be said for his foe.

  The monster burned, screeching and rolling in Jack’s grip until, at last, he let go. It continued to writhe and scream for nearly a full minute until, graciously, it died. Jack leaned back against the fence. Whatever had let him tap into those flames fled him. Coldness like he couldn’t even begin to imagine took ahold of his chest.

  The stars above went completely black. He slumped down, dagger still protruding from his gut.

  It was odd. He figured he’d be more used to dying, but it was just as terrifying as the previous two times. Still, sitting next to the burnt husk of the monster he’d killed, he smiled humorously.

  More of his vision started to darken. “I don’t think passing out this much can be good for me.”

  Jack laughed, succumbing to the fever’s siren call for sleep.

  Right as he was about to fade into the darkness once more, he heard a rough voice that reminded him of gravel and worn leather.

  “Bleed and boil me, what’re you doing out here, boy?!” the man asked, as the deep bass of his voice left no room for contest. “What was that horrible noise?!”

  Despite everything going on in his body—the pain, the fatigue, the fever, all of it—Jack had the good conscience to respond. He grinned awkwardly up in the direction he thought he heard the voice, as his eyelids were too heavy for him to lift at this point.

  “I followed your light. It’s a nice light. Ran away, but I found it,” Jack stated matter-of-factly. “Found an orc. Killed it. Wasn’t very nice. I… I think I’m dying.”

  He felt a calloused hand pressed against his forehead.

  “Ardent’s beard, you’re burnin’ up!” the man exclaimed. He did not seem pleased with this.

  “Sorry,” Jack responded out of habit.

  Jack heard him curse several times under his breath, then crouch back down.

  “If you’re another one of them dreamers, I’m going to lock you up until you’re thinking straight, ya hear?” the man promised.

  “I like dreams.”

  “Right. It’s as I feared. Up you come.” The farmer lifted him with such little effort that a distant, dull, part of Jack’s mind wondered how much this guy had invested in his strength.

  “I like Resilience. Myrtle told me so,” Jack quipped, his words slurred and slow.

  The man paused in his tracks. A distant part of Jack felt his shirt slip off one shoulder, likely falling apart from one of the orc’s slashes. Had he missed one and just not noticed it?

  “Oh. Oh, no,” was all the man said.

  What? What is it? Jack wondered in a daze.

  “Boil my luck. It just had to be you, huh? Amelia, what are ya up to?” the man mumbled to himself.

  Who’s Amelia? Jack thought he said it out loud, but he didn’t feel his lips move. Hell, he didn’t feel much of anything at all now.

  When the man resumed, he was moving at a significantly quicker clip.

  There was a creaking of a door and the complex aromas of something boiling atop a fire. Jack tried to open his eyes, and he barely glimpsed log crossbeams intersecting vaulted rafters. Hanging from them were all sorts of bundled herbs, iron skillets, and what might have been an empty scabbard.

  But before he could see more, the warmth of his new environment tugged him into a sleep he could no longer fight.