We slowed where the road dipped into a shallow hollow, then left it entirely, angling into the scrub and broken stone that rose on either side as natural wind breaks. Not shelter, exactly, but enough to blur the shape of a campfire from the road. Enough to look sensible at a glance without being obvious.

  Nadine eased the horses to a stop with careful hands that didn’t quite know what they were doing. The reins stayed loose anyway. The horses shifted, stamped once, then settled as if they’d agreed among themselves that this was close enough.

  She glanced back at me. “This is… good, right?”

  I nodded, hoping it was convincing. “It looks like it’s supposed to.”

  “I'm not sure that's an answer.”

  “It’s the best one I have.”

  She snorted quietly and slid down from the cart, moving stiffly. I followed more slowly, scanning the hollow with the vague, secondhand confidence of someone who’d read about places like this far more often than she’d ever used one.

  Open enough to be seen. Covered enough to feel safe. The kind of campsite that existed in stories.

  “I still can’t believe we’re doing this,” Nadine muttered as she gathered a few stones for the fire. “Running from the church and setting a trap based on information out of a book you stole from your fiancé.”

  I grimaced. “I didn’t steal it. I borrowed it.”

  “You never gave it back.”

  “That doesn’t make it stolen.”

  She shot me a look. “It absolutely does.”

  I crouched beside her and helped stack the stones, aware of how thin my authority felt. “Laurent said the author was very thorough.”

  “Laurent also said the romantic tension was ‘essential to the plot.’”

  I hesitated. “Was it not?”

  She laughed then, a short, surprised sound, and some of the heaviness in her shoulders eased. Just a little.

  We worked in silence after that, the small, careful kind that didn’t demand attention. When the fire was lit, modest and open to the road, I stepped back and tried to see it the way someone else would.

  Tired travelers. Bad habits. A noble girl who didn’t know how to hide.

  It would do.

  I reached for my sword as the waiting set in, an old reflex from years of being told to be ready.

  My hand closed on nothing.

  The absence hit harder than I expected. Not because I needed it, but because I was used to it. The weight at my side. The quiet reassurance of having something familiar between myself and the unknown.

  My old sword was destroyed on my journey to Valoria. The dagger with it. And the staff… I didn’t let myself think about the staff for long. It wasn’t something I’d carried long enough to miss.

  I’d trained with more than blades over the years, but steel was what I understood best. It was a dance with bloody consequences, and one where I knew the steps. Distance. Timing. Openings. A blade meant I had to wait until the moment existed before I struck.

  Without it, there was only my body and my strength. Nothing between me and the hunger I was trying not to think about.

  I could kill without a weapon. I’d already proven that. Still, the thought sat wrong in my chest. It was a complex emotion I didn't have time to work out just now, so I pushed it to the side.

  I straightened and looked out past the firelight, toward the road we’d left behind hours ago. Whoever was following us would see this camp. They would think it was careless. I hoped they would.

  My attention drifted back to the camp when I felt Nadine’s eyes on me. She stood, and approached, looking for all the world like she was lost between amusement and dread, like she was about to confirm something I’d rather not know.

  She paused when she stopped beside me. “Before you go sneaking off…”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”

  She tilted her head. “I hadn't thought about this in the daylight, but it's a little obvious now. You know you’re glowing, right?”

  I blinked. “I am not.”

  “Mirela,” she said patiently, “you’ve been glowing since the cathedral. It’s subtle, but it’s there. And there’s…” She gestured vaguely above her own head. “Well, that's kind of like a beacon up there.”

  I frowned and lifted a hand, feeling nothing but air. “I don’t see anything.”

  “That’s because it moves with you,” she said. “I think.”

  I stared at her. She stared back.

  “Well,” I said slowly, “that’s inconvenient.”

  She huffed a quiet laugh despite herself. “A little.”

  She stepped forward and pulled the oversized hood of my mantle over my head. Sure enough, it felt like it settled against something just above me. She frowned, hand going to her chin, then hurried back to the cart and returned with a heavy cloak, likely the farmer’s, which she threw around my shoulders. With the second layer and the hood up, the glow dimmed, the light turning inward, bleeding faintly through the fabric instead of spilling freely into the dark.

  Nadine watched closely, making a quick circuit around me. “That helps,” she said. “Just… don’t look at them.”

  I paused. “What?”

  “If you look straight at someone, they’ll see it. Out of the corner of the eye, though…” She shrugged. “It passes as a trick of the light.”

  I let out a long, low breath. "Well. It'll have to do. Did you find a place to hide?"

  She nodded, gesturing toward the road, away from the campsite. “I found a shallow cut beside the road. Just a place where rain’s eaten away at the stone. Enough to break my outline. From the road it looks like nothing at all. Just like you said: At night, people look ahead, not down.”

  “Careful,” I said with a grin. “You’re starting to look like you know what you’re doing.”

  She rolled her eyes. "Let's get ready. They can't be far, now."

  "Stay safe."

  She stepped forward and wrapped me in a quick hug that I returned. "You, too."

  And then, she was off toward her hiding place.

  I left the firelight behind and let the night close around me, and it didn't take long for me to find them.

  The road ran pale beneath the moon, just visible enough to guide the horses without lanterns. They walked them slow, careful not to let tack clink or hooves strike stone too sharply. They were competent, and more importantly, confident. They believed surprise belonged to them.

  I followed from the scrub, keeping pace without trying. I didn’t need to hurry. I could hear them breathing. The leather of gloves. The faint creak of a saddle when weight shifted wrong.

  I counted four of them.

  The priest murmured something I couldn’t quite make out, a blessing or a reassurance, his voice pitched low. The paladin answered with a sound that might have been agreement. He carried himself like a man who expected resistance and welcomed it.

  The others were quieter, and I moved closer.

  I heard the one who looked like a mage first, his voice low and full of frustration. “We should’ve brought a lantern. Or at least a charm.”

  The scout snorted softly. “And announce ourselves from half a mile out? She’s not blind.”

  “She’s an enchanter,” the priest murmured. “And a sheltered noble, at that. I doubt she's watching the road at all.”

  “Still,” the mage said. “I don’t like this road. Its too quiet out here, and the open space is making me feel exposed.”

  The paladin adjusted his stride, and I heard the faint scrape of mail beneath his cloak. “We didn’t come this far to turn back now.”

  The scout stopped long enough to bend his bow, testing the tension. “The girl isn't helpless. If she was, my partner would still be riding with us.” The anger in his voice was subtle, but impossible to miss.

  “He’s alive,” the mage replied. “You said so yourself.”

  “Breathing isn’t living,” the scout argued. “Not after what she did to him. Next time, I won’t hesitate.”

  Next time wasn't something he was going to see.

  I risked another glance in their direction and got a better look, silently grateful for all the training I’d been put through over the years. It wasn't a mage with them, but a Spellbreaker. I could tell from his martial stance. His movements were too rigid and deliberate. The faint metallic scent on him wasn’t armor. It was worked runes cast in silver, woven into rings and buckles meant to drink magic as it passed. A man trained to step into the path of spells and unmake them. Dangerous to Nadine. Meaningless to me. They were prepared for her.

  “She nearly killed two of you,” the priest said calmly. “That alone warrants chastisement.”

  The scout bristled. “Chastisement?”

  “If she resists,” the priest continued, unbothered, “injury is acceptable. The body is what we're after. The false saint. Our primary goal is returning that crystal to the city. Nothing else matters."

  The paladin gave a curt nod. “Order will come from this. In time.”

  The spellbreaker hesitated. “And the girl?”

  “She’s a problem,” the priest said. “A dangerous one. But she’s not the goal.”

  Only a girl. I felt something inside me ease, just a fraction. It was less worry if they didn't plan to kill her on sight, but I didn't let it distract me. I doubt I could have.

  The hunger pressed closer when I stopped pretending these were people I needed to understand. They had voices. Worries. Someone waiting for them somewhere warm, perhaps. That didn’t change what they were to me.

  I had been told that my whole life and thought I understood. Now, I really did.

  I let the hunger sit nearer the surface, not guiding me, just sharpening the world. The night grew cleaner. Sounds separated themselves. Heartbeats became distinct.

  The paladin led his horse off the road first, stopping at a thin stand of brush. The others followed, looping reins and hobbles with practiced hands.

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  The priest gestured to the scout. “Go ahead. Find her. If anything feels wrong, signal. Just keep an eye on her. We will join you shortly.”

  The scout nodded and slipped away from the road, an arrow already resting on his bow.

  I followed.

  He moved well. Low and careful, choosing ground that wouldn’t betray him. He paused often to listen, eyes cutting back toward the camp and then forward again. He was tense in a way that suggested bad memories. A lesson learned painfully.

  Good. That would make this harder for him.

  I stayed just far enough back that he couldn’t hear my steps, just close enough to watch the rhythm of him. The way his shoulders rose when he listened. The way his pace changed when his attention heightened.

  It was… satisfying. Seeing the pattern. Slipping into it.

  When he slowed, I slowed with him. When he stopped, I stopped first.

  The hunger stirred at that, warm and pleased, like it approved of the game. I let it sit there, humming under my skin, sharpening my focus instead of dulling it.

  I let a stone roll farther off to the side, where the ground dipped and sound carried wrong. Not close enough to mean anything. Just enough to give him a direction.

  He paused.

  His head turned toward the sound, eyes narrowing as he scanned the brush. I stayed still, letting the night swallow me, my pulse steady and breath slow. There was a quiet thrill in knowing exactly where he would look next.

  When he shifted again, I moved only when his focus did, always behind the moment, never ahead of it. Close enough now that I could smell leather and sweat beneath the night air.

  He knew the tricks, and he let his class guide him. I could see it in how carefully he searched. He checked the ground where a foot should have disturbed it. He watched the edge of the road, not the dark beyond it.

  That made me smile. So I gave him nothing there.

  Another faint sound, farther off. I let a thread of light escape, drawing his eyes to bark instead of flesh. Each time he looked, the distance between us closed, one careful step at a time. Each misdirection fed the hunger in me, not with urgency, but with anticipation.

  He reached a place where the road dipped slightly and crouched, peering toward the cart. His bow came up, arrow nocked, breath measured and slow.

  So controlled. So… alive.

  Then his posture changed, suddenly more alert. It wasn't panic. It was training.

  He shifted his weight, scanning again, this time wider. Slower. Listening longer between breaths. I felt the moment when certainty left him, when his search stopped being about finding something and became about not being alone.

  The hunger pressed closer, delighted now, no longer content to watch from a distance.

  I stayed where I was.

  He had learned to find things that moved. I knew how to wait. And I was enjoying it far more than I should have been.

  He shifted his weight, scanning again, and I let the faintest brush of light catch a tree behind him. Just enough to be wrong.

  He turned.

  I was already too close.

  There was no moment for him to shout. No space to draw properly.

  I took him by the collar and pulled him back into the scrub, hard enough that the breath left him in a sharp, startled sound. My hand closed over his mouth as his body went rigid, every muscle locking at once as he tried to twist free.

  Too slow.

  I sank my teeth into the side of his neck.

  The first taste hit like rain on scorched earth. Warm. Alive. Power surged with it, flooding through me so fast it stole my breath. The ache in my throat vanished as if it had never been there, the constant, gnawing pain replaced by something rich and grounding that spread outward with every swallow.

  He jerked once beneath my grip, a reflex more than struggle. Then the venom took hold.

  His body went slack in my arms, strength bleeding out of him along with the blood. His heart fluttered wildly against my senses, fast and panicked, then uneven as I drank deep and without restraint. I hadn’t expected so much from him. There was weight to it. Experience. Levels earned the hard way.

  It was intoxicating.

  I drank quickly and efficiently, the way I had been taught, even as my instincts screamed for more. Heat poured through my limbs, settling into torn muscle and strained sinew, knitting them back together from the inside out. The constant, low pain beneath my skin faded, leaving me whole in a way I hadn’t felt since before the evolution.

  The entire world was suddenly clearer, and the strength that followed felt denser, more potent, as though the blood resonated with me in a way it hadn’t before.

  By the time his heart stuttered and finally fell silent, I was already pulling back, breath steadying as the hunger loosened its grip. It wasn’t gone. It never was, but it had quieted enough to think.

  I lowered him to the ground and eased him down so he wouldn’t fall. His bow slipped from his fingers and I caught it before it could strike stone, fingers closing with practiced care. The night swallowed the sound.

  My abilities stirred at the edge of awareness again, manageable now. Options unfolding where there had been only restraint moments before. I didn’t let it distract me. There were still others to deal with.

  I froze and listened. His companions hadn’t noticed yet. If all went well, they wouldn’t, not for a little while. They would assume he’d repositioned and was doing his job.

  I wiped my hand on the grass and stepped back, already thinking about who came next. A small thrill rose with the anticipation of what followed.

  The night felt different after I’d fed. The edge that had driven me eased, settling behind the quieter pull of my own desire to hunt and the need to protect Nadine. But it wasn’t only that.

  The strain that had lingered along my shoulders and spine since waking—my body remembering wings that failed to follow me back—was gone, washed away along with the worst of the hunger. I moved more easily now, each step lighter, more certain, as if the world had finally decided to keep up. Magic stirred in my veins, a constant new presence, no longer something I had to reach for.

  I left the scout where he lay and circled back toward the road, keeping low as the remaining three moved forward. They didn’t rush. They advanced with the careful confidence of people who believed they were still in control.

  The campfire came into view, a dull red smear against the dark.

  They entered it together.

  I watched their shapes break apart as they fanned through the campsite, boots nudging bedrolls, eyes snapping to the cart, to the fire, to the empty space where Nadine should have been.

  “No one’s here,” the paladin said, sharp with irritation.

  The spellbreaker frowned. “She must have seen him.”

  “Then he failed,” the priest said quietly.

  “If she spotted him early, she could’ve bolted,” the paladin said.

  The spellbreaker shook his head. “Not that one. He wouldn’t have let her slip past.” He paused as a thought struck him. "Unless… he grabbed her."

  That idea settled badly between them.

  The priest straightened. “Focus. We’ll search the perimeter. She can’t have gone far.”

  They began to turn outward, attention pulling away from the road, from the dark behind them.

  From him.

  The priest hesitated a moment behind the others, staff in hand, lips moving as if he were already halfway into prayer. He was alone now. Exposed.

  I moved.

  I crossed the space between us in a breath, reaching for him as I had the scout—

  And the night flared.

  Light spilled from me in a sudden, searing pulse, not bright enough to blind, but intense enough that it burned against my own senses. The borrowed cloak dulled it, but not enough, and the air itself seemed to recoil.

  The priest screamed, but it wasn't fear. It was pain.

  He stumbled back, staff swinging wildly as the radiance washed over him, and I twisted aside just in time. Wood cracked against stone where my head had been a moment before. My hood tore free, sliding from my shoulders as I ducked under the next panicked swing.

  The glow escaped fully then, bleeding out around me in a soft, relentless halo.

  “Saint’s blood,” the priest gasped, dropping to one knee as the light pressed against him. “She’s—”

  The word died as I struck.

  I closed the distance and caught his wrist, wrenching the staff wide before driving my shoulder into his chest. He went down hard, breath leaving him in a sharp, helpless sound, and I followed, twisting his arm behind his back.

  I bit into the arm, barely long enough to fill my mouth with blood, but that wasn't the point.

  The pain faded almost immediately from him. I felt it happen, the sharp edge of sensation blunting into numbness as the venom took hold. His body went slack beneath me almost immediately, limbs unresponsive, eyes wide and aware but helpless.

  He wasn’t dead, but he was finished for now.

  The glow was still pouring off me, stronger now without the cloak, and the air shifted as the others reacted.

  “There!” the spellbreaker shouted.

  Steel hissed as the paladin turned, sword clearing its sheath in one smooth motion. I heard Nadine gasp from somewhere near the cart, felt the crackle of magic as she acted on instinct. It was too loud, and impossible to miss.

  I tore my mouth from the priest and rose, blood singing through me, power coiled and ready in a way it hadn’t been before. Celerity came without strain. Strength followed, effortless and clean. I could end this, but I couldn’t do it carelessly.

  The paladin was already charging me.

  For half a heartbeat, I saw Nadine. She wasn't panicking, and she didn't freeze. She was moving.

  The spellbreaker had turned toward her, one hand already lifting, sigils on his gear flaring faintly as he reached for whatever counter he favored. Nadine didn’t give him the space to finish it. Light cracked in quick, uneven bursts around her, spells thrown too fast to shape into anything elegant. Sparks and pressure and sound, all of it cheap, fast, and relentless. Nothing meant to break through his defenses. Spells meant to make him stop.

  I felt his frustration from across the camp as he threw up hurried defenses, intercepting one spell only to have another snap against his flank. He couldn’t advance. The spells were just dangerous enough that they couldn't be ignored. She was pinning him in place with pure volume and timing.

  Clever girl.

  But it wouldn’t last. I could see it in the way his footing adjusted, in the way he began to angle his counters instead of reacting. He was learning her rhythm.

  And I didn’t have time to help.

  The paladin hit me like a collapsing wall.

  Steel screamed as his bastard sword came down in a brutal, overhand cut meant to split me from shoulder to hip. I twisted aside on instinct, Celerity snapping through me without effort, the blade passing close enough that I felt the air tear where I’d been.

  Too close.

  I struck back with both hands, driving into his chestplate with blood-fueled strength that dented steel and rocked him a step backward. He grunted, boots scraping stone, and came back in immediately, shield snapping up to catch my follow-up blow.

  His every movement was hard, disciplined, and unafraid.

  My radiance washed over him as we closed, biting into the edges of his aura, but he bore it with clenched teeth and a low, furious prayer. Corrupted or not, his faith held.

  I couldn’t just tear through him.

  He pressed, sword working in tight, efficient arcs, forcing me to give ground. Each strike was meant to herd me, not kill me outright. He was trying to pin me where armor and weight would matter more than speed.

  Fine.

  I slipped inside his guard, caught his sword arm with one hand and wrenched, feeling muscle strain under mail. He responded instantly, slamming his shield into my ribs hard enough to send me skidding across the ground.

  Pain flared—and vanished just as quickly.

  I rolled to my feet, already moving again, breath steady, blood roaring in my ears. My muscles answered without protest, strength flowing cleanly instead of burning out of me. Whatever my evolution had done, it had stripped away the friction.

  He came at me again.

  We collided in close quarters, bodies crashing together, grappling more than trading blows. I hooked a leg, tried to throw him, and he countered with a brutal elbow that glanced off my shoulder instead of my jaw by sheer luck.

  This wasn’t a duel. This was close, ugly, and vicious, and he was good. Better trained than I was. Slower, yes—but relentless, armored, and utterly committed.

  I caught his sword arm as he tried to bring the hilt down on me, twisted hard, and drove him back toward the edge of the firelight. Sparks leapt as steel scraped stone. Somewhere behind him, I heard Nadine cry out as the spellbreaker finally forced his way forward.

  Time was running out.

  I surged, Blood-Fueled Strength flaring as I drove him down onto one knee, my radiance searing against his defenses. He roared in pain and fury, sword clattering from his grasp as I wrenched it free.

  But he didn’t fall. He looked up at me, teeth bared, and lunged anyway.

  I shifted aside instead of meeting him, letting his momentum carry past.

  There wasn’t time to think about Nadine. If I hesitated, if I split my attention, this would drag on. Armor, faith, and discipline only mattered if I let them.

  I didn’t.

  He broke contact just long enough to dive for his sword. Fingers closed around the blade itself, gauntlet screeching as he hauled it up and swung the hilt at my head like a hammer.

  Celerity carried me inside the strike, past the line of the swing.

  My claws flashed up and in. Steel shrieked as they raked across his gorget, tearing links free and crushing flesh beneath. One claw scraped hard against mail and chipped, the jolt sharp enough that I hissed despite myself.

  Annoying.

  The other found what it needed.

  I drove it in under his jaw and tore sideways. Blood sprayed hot across my wrist as his focus shattered, hands flying up in a reflexive, useless attempt to stop it.

  I used that moment to slam him face-first into the ground and dropped onto his back before he could recover, one knee pinning him as I tore his helm free.

  I sank my teeth into the exposed side of his neck.

  His shout died in my grip as the venom followed a heartbeat later, my hand clamped hard over his mouth to smother any sound that might have escaped.

  He went rigid. Then slack.

  I felt the paralysis take him, venom overwhelming his last, desperate resistance, his body betraying him in seconds despite his strength and training. A higher level than I’d expected. He lasted longer than most.

  Good for him.

  I rose, already turning away, blood still roaring through me, and reached for the shadow—

  —and the world lurched and reformed behind the spellbreaker.

  He’d managed to get an arm around Nadine, trying to drag her back, his other hand flaring with half-formed magic as he struggled to restrain her without breaking her. I hit him before he could finish it.

  I tore him off her and drove him into the dirt, my radiance flaring bright enough that he cried out and shielded his eyes. His magic sputtered, disrupted not by countering, but by pain and proximity.

  “I’m just—” he gasped, scrambling, panic finally breaking through his composure.

  Nadine stumbled back, breath ragged, staring at me like she was seeing something new. Something frightening. Something undeniable.

  “Mirela,” she said, struggling for words. “He’s… he’s not one of them.”

  I understood the mercy she was offering him. And maybe, in some small way, offering me as well. She was right. The light didn't burn him. He was just an adventurer. Paid help. A man who hadn’t signed on for this.

  For an instant, I saw the first adventuring party I’d traveled with, flickering through my mind like a half-remembered dream.

  I nodded.

  I didn’t feed. I struck.

  Hard enough to break ribs. Hard enough to leave him stunned and senseless, the fight driven out of him even as his body tried to obey.

  I left him there, because I still had work to do.

  I turned back toward the paladin.

  He lay where I’d dropped him, paralyzed, eyes wide and aware, chest rising in shallow, helpless breaths. He could feel nothing now. No pain. No strength. Just waiting.

  Nadine saw it. All of it.

  The priest was the same, collapsed at the edge of the camp, venom holding him in place, breath shallow in the firelight.

  I didn’t hurry. I moved methodically, bringing things to a close.

  I knelt by the paladin and ended him cleanly, the way I’d been taught, claws precise and efficient. No waste. No struggle. No sound.

  When I rose again, Nadine was still staring. But this wasn't over.

  I turned back to the priest.

  He lay where he’d fallen, consciousness trapped behind a body that would no longer answer. Faith clung to him as reflex alone, powerless without a body to carry it. Whatever gods he’d turned to could no longer answer him.

  This one, I didn’t hesitate. I knelt beside him and fed.

  The blood was thinner than the scout’s, strained by fear and belief, but it was still enough. Warm. Steady. The last of the hunger eased as I drank, the restless edge inside me settling into something calm and clear. The world finally felt right again.

  When I finished, I lowered him gently to the ground. Only then did I look up.

  Nadine was still there. She hadn’t turned away. Her hands were clenched at her sides, breath shallow, eyes fixed on me. She was afraid. Anyone would be. But she stood her ground, watching, forcing herself to understand what she was seeing instead of flinching from it.

  I met her gaze and waited.

  She swallowed hard, then nodded once. It wasn't approval. Just acceptance.

  The night settled around us at last.

  Quiet, but not empty.

  MESSIAH OF STEEL

  When faith meets firepower… sparks will fly.

  Derek Steele was once a man of science, a brilliant engineer who built his own power armor from scavenged alien tech. He believed in data, not destiny. Then a relic from a forgotten civilization ripped him from Earth… and dropped him into a realm where magic spheres grant power, and gods rule through their chosen champions.

  Messiah of Steel.

  “Iron Man crashes into epic fantasy and nothing will be the same.”

  New chapters every week ? Progression Fantasy ? LitRPG