The adventurer.

The priest was a known quantity. His skill set would be bothersome for me, being highly resistant to Dark Magic, as I suspected. And he lived in the church, which was sure to have all manner of protective countermeasures against devils. I'd probably need to deal with the priest last.

The adventurer, however, was an unknown. The villager I'd interrogated had had no knowledge of his skills, background, or capabilities, so I knew nothing. I wanted to remove the adventurer from the playing field quickly and quietly.

I moved through a few of the other houses, executing a few more of the men and binding their women as I made my way towards my real target. It hadn't taken much of my time, and I didn't want to find myself in a scuffle without having thinned the herd a bit more.

I knew which house was his, but this one had not been left unlocked. He had seen too much of the world not to habitually lock his door, I supposed. Smart man. As quietly as I could, I worked the blade of my knife at a weak spot in the wood around a window until I could pry open the lock and get it open. It took time, but I didn't want to break a window and risk waking him, and the rest of the house was secure. There was no other stealthy way in that I saw.

When I was halfway through the window, however, I heard a soft clack noise from further inside and then a crossbow bolt slammed into my shoulder, nearly throwing me back out the window. The sound was repeated, and I threw myself inside and into a roll behind cover. Another bolt took me in the thigh as I cleared the window.

Health 38/53

I hadn't seen anything inside the house, not even with my enhanced vision. But now I was fully alert and what I couldn't see, I could smell. Potions, magical compounds, oiled steel. The adventurer was awake, and had clearly not been taken by surprise.

"I don't know what you are or why you're in my house," a gruff voice said from the next room. "But I saw you working with that knife. You're not an animal." He wasn't conversing so much as announcing he would be very careful to kill me properly, and wouldn't likely give me an easy time of killing him back.

I pulled the bolt from my shoulder with a wince. The tip was good steel, very fine craftsmanship; not like the wares I'd seen in the blacksmith's shop. This guy really had been around. There was no telling what else he had at his disposal.

Making a note to give myself some kind of regenerative quality as soon as I could, I pulled the bolt from my thigh and reached for one of my defensive spells. It seemed as good a time as any to try one on.

Priest Skill: Light Magic - Ironskin
Health 38/53
Mana 78/90

Damage Resistance: 00:29:59

"A magic lizard, are ye? Well, that sure makes this interesting. I take it you aren't going to just leave. Very well, I surrender."

I paused, taken aback, but then a loud boom shook the room I was in and a bright flash of light blinded me momentarily. I ducked defensively in surprise and was met with another round of crossbow bolts biting into my side. Thunk, thunk, thunk.

Health 27/53

This was not going well. I still hadn't even seen my attacker! I knew he was in the room from the angle the bolts had pierced me, but there was no sign of him to any of my senses except hearing. And he was not so foolish as to constantly announce his location. With a snarl, I lunged across the room, whipping my tentacles in broad sweeps across the open space. I felt a sharp pain to my left as the tentacle that had checked one corner of the room was cut clean through. Part of it fell to the floor, oozing something.

"Ah, I figured those things weren't just for show. So you're one of those **** monsters, are ye?" the voice said from the corner. His position was already forfeit before he'd spoken, but that confirmed it.

The loss of limb was less than ideal. But at least I'd found the adventurer.

I spun before he'd have a chance to reposition—I hoped—and fanned tentacles out to cut off any undetected escape. A swish of steel through air and another tentacle was severed painfully. I snarled and directed more of the tentacles towards him just to make sure he wouldn't move without me noticing. As expected, he knew how to handle whatever weapon it was he was defending himself with, but I didn't have a lot of options. I needed him to stand still. All of my smooth tentacles sprayed their adhesive stuff as I struck at him, but it didn't seem to be slowing him down much if at all.

The spell I was casting took a long time to warm up, as it turned out. I closed slowly as I cast, sacrificing more and more of my precious limbs to his blade. It hurt like hell, but I wasn't sure I'd get another chance. At least the loss of portions of my tentacles didn't seem to cost me much in the way of health. As I loosed my spell, I hoped I'd be able to grow those back.

Priest Skill: Elemental Smite - Ice
Health 21/53

A flash of power arced across the space between me and the adventurer as an explosion of sheer cold occurred right where he was standing. He grunted and slammed into the wall behind him. Something clattered to the floor. He wasn't down, but most importantly, he appeared as a dark spot in my heat vision. His body was now very cold, and whatever magical invisibility he was using hadn't been been made to hide in that way.

I withdrew my damaged tentacles, spraying a bit of the adhesive around the floor in the hopes that his weapon was lost to him, and lunged again.

I crashed into him, jaws snapping for his head but somehow closing around air. The **** of my lunge slammed his body back into the wall again and I heard his head crack against it, and something very sharp impaled me through the gut. Damn, the guy was good. I was vaguely aware of the fact that I'd have been killed if not for my Ironskin spell.

Health 12/53

Damage Resistance: 00:26:14

But I had closed the distance. I had hands on him. He couldn't hide anymore, and I had not just been made for ranged combat. I slammed him into the wall again and gained a better sense of where his body actually was. He was crouching down or something, making himself much shorter than I'd thought. My ice spell had struck some kind of barrier and that was what I'd seen turn cold. It was much taller than he was.

But once I had identified the location of his head, it was over. I slashed with my knife towards his throat, knowing he'd try to dodge it, and brought the heavy blacksmith's hammer down on his head with a satisfying crunch. He went down, unmoving. Instinct told me to cut his throat anyway, but experience flooded into me. It was over.