The Stolen Eyes

Chapter 1.3 A slight breeze

1.3 | Lamad

Quite a spectacular view. The boy was laying on the ground in a pitiful state. His face was covered in blood that leaked from all of his orifices. Not appetizing. At least he was still breathing. Alright, at least I was pretty sure that he was breathing.

I kicked his shin lightly. No reaction. Great. You die for a bit and everything goes to shit.

"The daimon survived!" The voice of one of those pesky mages rang through the park.

Daimon? There is a daimon here? I was pretty sure I would have noticed a damn daimon. Those things were massive. After closer observation, there was a small detail that I had missed. The mage was pointing at me.

Ah. Now I understood. My head was always a bit muffled, just after I came back. They were trying to hunt me. They were idiots! Very, very violent idiots, as it seemed. At least, what I would do next, could count as self-defense.

I counted. Nine left. I smiled at the mage. "No, no, you are not quite...shit. You are not quite...right?" I nearly fumbled the last word - my Ancient Greek was surprisingly rusty. I made a mental note to read some Homer later.

My finger pointed towards my corpse, which was lying on the lawn unceremoniously. "I did not survive. You managed to kill me." I took a step towards it. "Which was not very nice of you." And it hurt like hell.

They moved to surround me again. "We can kill you a second time!"

A laugh escaped from my mouth. "Who told you I would let you murder me again?" Their eyes betrayed some of their confusion and I used their moment of hesitation to my advantage, sprinting towards my rucksack.

The stereotypically evil mages (STEM), started to chant something. Honestly, I was never good with remembering long greek chants. Normally it did not matter either way, they usually did not survive long enough to finish them.

Too late. I grabbed a throwing knife from the bag and threw it. Only a small thump could be heard, followed by one of them covering the ground in their blood. Eight.

"So, guys and gals," I took out a short sword, my trusty old gladius, "who of you had the brilliant idea to attack a mobile target with a combined chant?" Bloody amateurs.

The first STEM in front of me disappointingly parried my sword. Great, slightly trained amateurs.

Her eyes looked at me with confusion, focussing on my neck. "Surprised that it's still attached?" Our swords were trembling from the force of the impact. "How are you alive, daimon?" Her voice was disturbingly high-pitched and grating. She had probably used three or four spells already.

"I don't think that you should ask stupid questions while fighting." I let go of my sword and caught it in my other hand, stabbing her in the stomach.

She fell to her knees while holding the gushing wound. "And if you want to ask questions, you should not have attacked me." A quick kick to her face made her slump over with a thud. Seven left.

"Next." I looked towards the remaining STEMs and invited them with a middle finger. One of them laughed maniacally (of course) and attacked me with a precast fireball. I turned around and ran in a zigzag pattern, darting from right to left. A strong, simple spell was a surprisingly good choice, the only question was, why it still had not missed me.

The sweltering heat behind me surprisingly did not disappear. I rolled my eyes and shouted. "Are you fucking kidding me, a homing spell? What are you, second circle mages?"