Tess gasped in pain as the water overtook her. The deluge pushed her down the hill, tumbling her around like clothes in a dryer. She struggled to breathe, every tumble knocking the air out of her lungs.

She landed against something hard, stunning her. The world blacked out for a moment.

Tess’s status screen appeared, showing a drop of fifty points to her health. Her vision hazily came back into focus, revealing a mess of a forest around her.

A trio of men with spears stood over Tess. At first, they seemed to be friendly, as none had yet made a move. But as Tess’s ears came back into focus she realized her mistake.

“Look, I’m just saying we could get a lot selling her,” one of the soldiers argued. “Wouldn’t be hard to keep her out.”

“No prisoners, remember?” another soldier said. “We’re teaching these Osari bastards a lesson this time.”

“Yeah, I know. But she’s got pink skin! If we can pass her off to some lord we’ll be sitting pretty with more money than we can count.”

Tess did her best to stay still. No reason to let these soldiers realize she’d woken. Silently, Tess replaced her skills. She replaced Archery with Unarmed Fighting, having lost her weapons in the faux tsunami. Then, just in case, Tess replaced Free To Play Unit with Emergency Line. She wasn’t sure if Stoneskin could get her through this predicament.

Tess waited for them to finish arguing, as the longer it took for them to finish the more her health could regenerate. Eventually, the prudent soldier won out. None of them were smart enough to figure out how to stow someone as noticeable as Tess from sight.

The prudent soldier turned, stabbing at Tess’s head with his spear. Tess jerked her head to the side, activating Stoneskin with a thought. She winced as the speartip clipped her ear, but it wasn’t enough to slow her down.

Tess leaped to her feet, pulling on the spear with her left hand while striking out with her right. Her punch crunched the soldier’s nose, sending him reeling backward.

“She’s awake!” one of the two yelled.

“I can see that!” the other shouted. “Get her!”

Both soldiers stabbed out with their spears. Tess dodged the one on the left but felt the other strike her in the gut.

“She’s got some kinda magic!” the soldier yelled. “My spear barely got her.”

Tess didn’t bother to look at her wound and just lashed out with a kick, more to keep the two from closing in on her than to connect. The soldier to her right moved back, giving her space to turn and rush the one on the left.

Unprepared, the soldier tried to stab with his spear again, but Tess had already moved inside its range. The top slid off her skin with an annoying buzz as Tess leaped forward with a Ancestral Guard activated knee. An illusory knee covered Tess’s own as she struck, the soldier folding in on himself like a flip phone.

Tess grabbed the soldier and twisted, assuming the man behind her would try striking while her back was turned. Sure enough, the man had stabbed out. Tess’s move caused him to pull his strike back, the soldier unwilling to harm his friend.

Tess took the initiative, pushing the crumpled soldier into his companion while grabbing his discarded spear. The standing soldier caught his unconscious friend, shunting them to the side with the shaft of his spear.

“You’ll pay for that,” he growled.

Tess responded by throwing her recently acquired spear, using Ancestral Guard to give it some kick. It whizzed at the soldier, who rolled out of the way. He stood to find Tess almost on top of him, the woman having used the attack as a distraction to get close.

The soldier grunted as a straight kick caught him in the gut, bending him forward for an easy punch to the jaw. The man fell to the ground, brain rattled to unconsciousness.

Tess whirled, taking stock of the area as she caught her breath.

Tess waved the box away as her eyes picked up another shape. The shape groaned, pushing aside the litany of snapped twigs and fallen branches to stand.

“Those cowards,” Alai slurred. “Magic is dishonorable.”

Tess moved to the young man, noticing the various dents in his plate armor. She grabbed his helmet, prying it off his head to get a look at him.

She waved to get Alai’s attention. “Alai, how many fingers am I holding up?”

It took a bit for the teenager to respond. “The whole hand,” he slurred after a moment.

“You have a concussion,” Tess said. “Come on, you need to get out of that armor.”

Tess started to pull loose the various straps and buckles on Alai’s armor.

“This is my Father’s armor,” Alai said after a bit. He attempted to slap Tess’s hand away.

“You need rest,” Tess said. “You can make the concussion worse if you move too much.”

“I still can’t carry him in full armor,” Tess said. “And I can’t wait for him to recover. Not with an army searching for us.”

Alai continued to try and push Tess away, but the woman refused. She quickly doffed the teenager of his armor and then swung him around in a fireman’s carry.

“Alright, let’s get out of here,” she said.

Alai groaned, the movement making him dizzy.

Tess marched, the only thought in her mind to evade the enemy soldiers. Luckily, the forest provided plenty of cover, easily breaking sight lines. The sounds of battle continued around the forest, pockets of turned around soldiers meeting chasing enemies.

Tess knew just as well how easy it was to get turned around in the forest, and used all her skill to keep moving in a straight line. She kept the sounds of battle behind her, focusing on larger objects in the forest. As she reached the new objects, Tess quickly picked out a new bearing and made her way to it.

Eventually, the sounds of battle died down, but Tess could still hear others in the brush behind her, likely following her noisy retreat. Alai had quieted, the teenager still awake but dazed. He seemed to be recovering, but Tess wasn’t about to stop and ask.

Her muscles started to ache a bit later, the adrenaline in her system finally running out. Tess still didn’t stop, marching along as the forest grew denser. Fallen trees now blocked much of the path, and Tess found herself losing sight of her bearings for small periods of time.

Finally, the sun started to dip low, elongating the shadows and increasing the forest’s eeriness. There were still sounds of others following, but Tess could afford to slow down in the darkness. As far as she could tell, Jejende didn’t have night vision.

Neither did Tess for that matter. Luckily, the light of the twin moons brightened the night more than Tess was used to, and her eyes adjusted.

Alai finally stirred as Tess slowed. She felt him wake, then jerk like a floundering fish.

“Hold still,” Tess hissed. “I don’t want to drop you.”

Alai started to yell. “Put me—mmph!”

Tess clapped a hand over the teenager’s mouth, muffling his shout. However, to stop him from revealing their location Tess was forced to shift her shoulder, and the two fell to the ground.

Tess rolled out from under Alai, silencing him with her hand again before he could shout once more.

“Are you crazy?” she whispered. “Do you want every soldier chasing us to know where we are? You barely escaped that battle alive.”

Alai attempted to protest, but only muffled noises escaped his lips.

“Now, you listen to me,” Tess hissed. “I didn’t have to save you. The only reason I did is because I was trained to rescue others, and rescue them I will. But if that means getting myself killed because you can’t listen so help me god I will tie you up here and leave you. Understood?”

Alai made a noise to answer.

“Just nod,” Tess growled. “If you make anymore noise I’m not giving you a choice.”

Thankfully for Tess, her tone finally got across to the dense teenager. He nodded silently.

Tess removed her hand from him. “Good. Now, we should move a bit more since there’s some light. You see that tree in the distance? That’s where we’re headed. You follow at my back and don’t stop.”

Alai nodded again.

Tess stood, slowly just in case soldiers had caught wind of her position. When her scanning revealed nothing, the woman walked toward the tree. Alai followed dutifully behind.

Tess ignored the box. She couldn’t afford to say anything at the moment, no matter how much she wanted to complain.

Upon reaching the tree, Tess had Alai help her gather the various fallen branches, arranging them into a makeshift shelter. The two went into a fitful sleep, every sound waking them.

The next morning greeted Tess with stiff joints and stiffer muscles. Everything ached, and Tess was sure she’d torn something during their retreat.

Alai, however, seemed to be more alert than yesterday. Tess envied this planet’s ability to shrug off wounds in a matter of hours instead of weeks. There were plenty of times where such a thing would have been lifesaving on Earth.

She’d likely have survived a landslide if she had this ability.

Tess shook her head, trying to physically push the thoughts of Earth away. There were more important things to do. She needed to find Mirari and get Alai back to his parents.

But first, Tess opened her skill list and changed out some abilities. One of her newer skills, Let Them Eat Cake, let her conjure a piece of bread, making it vastly more useful than Onomonopia. A skill that required her to reveal her position sounded terrible at the moment.  Tess also replaced Emergency Line with Free To Play unit, figuring the increase in damage was more important than a risky heal.

Since her bow was gone, Tess kept Unarmed Fighting and replaced Protein Powder with Super Hearing. She would likely need the increased sense to find running water.

“Okay,” Tess said once she’d prepared herself. “Our first order of business is to find a water source. Then, we can work on finding our location and heading back.”

“Why is water first?” Alai asked. “Getting home should be more important.”

“And how are you going to make it home without water to drink?” Tess asked. “Can you conjure some?”

“No,” Alai said. “But it can’t be that hard to find water.”

Tess sighed. “I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt because you’re in a bad situation, but in the future its not a good idea to question someone who’s trying to help you.”

“Father says that we should always question decisions,” Alai answered stubbornly.

“Why did I save you,” Tess grumbled.

Alai looked away, hurt.

Tess wasn’t in the mood to apologize, and Alai was finally silent. Tess closed her eyes, letting her enhanced hearing do its work. The sounds of buzzing insects greeted her first, followed by small creatures rustling through the brush. Tess tuned their noises out and kept listening. Soon she heard the sound of running water in the distance.

“Alright, come on,” Tess said to Alai. “Let’s get that water source.”

“Alright,” Alai answered depressingly.

The two walked for a while, travel slowed by the heavy amount of downed tree branches covered in underbrush. More than once Tess found her foot breaking through some rotted wood, scraping her leg before she could recover. The wound healed in minutes, but it was uncomfortable every time.

At least Alai didn’t have to worry about falling since he was following Tess.

Eventually, the sounds of running water grew loud enough for even Alai to hear.

“Looks like we have some luck,” Tess said. “If we can hear it now the water should be safe enough to drink.”

“How’s that?” Alai asked.

“Still water is filled with all kinds of bad stuff,” Tess answered.

She stepped over a rotting branch. “Drinking still water is likely going to give you the worst stomach ache of your life, and in the worst case kill you.”

Alai gulped.

“But moving water doesn’t let all that bad stuff accumulate,” Tess continued. “And the faster the water moves the less likely it is for there to be contaminants.”

“So it’s safe to drink?” Alai asked.

“Most likely,” Tess answered. “But we’ll still be careful. You can’t account for everything in situations like this.”

Tess stepped over another fallen branch and past another tree before seeing the water source. Sure enough, the river moved swiftly, fast enough for rapids to form.

“Perfect,” Tess said.