[Shinra: Death Walker: Assassin Level 8][20,000 Experience Points: 7500 to level 9 | 9 Skill Points][Health 800/1600 | Strength (Vampiric Boost) 40 | Speed 60 | Intelligence 34 | Dexterity 60| Charisma 11 | Wisdom 23 | Magic 0][Skills: Fade 2 | Silence 1 | Knife Mastery 1 | Assassin Kata 1 | Sprint 1][Hidden Path: Critical Strike 2 | Daemon Prediction ][Shadow Path: Vampire Vision | Shadow Strike ]Shinra was stunned by the shadow dagger in his hand. ‘It feels… real!’ He made a few slices in the air, but it didn’t feel like a blade exactly. There was no wind resistance, for one thing. ‘Will it disappear if I take it out into the light?’ It seemed like a reasonable test. Holding the shadow dagger in front of him, he stepped out of the shadow of the chimney and into the moonlight. He was almost afraid to look, worried that this expensive skill had big limitations. ‘It would be just my luck, waiting on this skill, waiting to unlock higher tier skills, and this is

The armoured monster looked like a Mage Knight, except it was half again as big as most men, standing at least 8 feet tall. The armour was a swirled black and blue, with hints of silver shining through near the edges. The effect was like a painting of a galaxy… or a tarnished silver tea pot. It swung a 6 foot long broadsword through the air in front of it, as if testing its weight. Impressive, because it held it in one hand. The other hand held a small bronze rod, covered in dense runes. A dark velvet cape fluttered from its shoulders, obviously of high quality, but covered in the dirt of battles and the grave. ‘You could almost think it was just a regular knight,’ Selena thought, but then she looked into the visor of the Knight’s helm, and shuddered. ‘Those burning coal eyes are not human. Malevolent magic seeps out of them.’ If she focused her vision, she could partially see the weaves and auras that encircled the demon. Vampires lost the ability to work with magic the wa

Eyes are immensely important, and do complicated things. The eyes of Vampires are even more impressive than the human equivalent, because they see in several spectrums. For all that, their structure is simple, the magic happens in the signal processing in the nerves and brain. Selena pulled her fingernails from her eyes, the jelly a little sticky on her fingertips. She squeezed her eyelids shut tight, and listened for the Death Knight, but it hadn’t moved. ‘Was it shocked by my self blinding, or is it preparing a finishing blow?’ she wondered. She could feel her eyes inflating under her eyelids. ‘Should be healed in a moment, I need to prepare.’ She tried not to imagine the Knight’s greatsword silently arcing towards her neck. Instead, she bit her lip, and, with the blood that welled out, she drew a rune on her forehead. She directed all of her attention to the rune, and felt her power concentrate there. Then the rune seeped into her skin, and the power penetrated her min

Selena was suddenly frozen, as if she’d dipped into a nitrogen bath. Was that the icy touch of death chilling her down to her very soul? She didn’t know, but the oppressive pressure of that massive sword was splitting her scalp.Then it was gone, leaving a healing slice and a gout of blood that had frozen in her hair. ‘What the hell?’ she thought. Her mind and soul had not quite caught up to the fact that she was alive. Luckily her hands knew how to kill without her input, and they continued the deadly sweep of the blood scythe. It bit deep into the Necromancer, and sliced from the collar bone down past his solar plexus. It stopped there, impeded, finally by the spells and bone armour he’d used to stop her Katana so easily. She didn’t try to pull the scythe out of the pre-dead mage. Instead she let go, and made a weaving motion with both hands, and the scythe unknit itself and flowed back to her as a surge of red power. Selena looked noticeably healthier and stronger as she

Balaam fired two point blank pulses from his phased field shifter, and it seemed like the very air cracked around the young angel hybrid. She looked surprised as Balaam's spear easily pierced her armour, where her central regulator should be. Blue fluid spurted from the wound as her eyes rolled back and an electric discharge seemed to flee from them.'Fucking Angels, and their kin, harder to get rid of than [cockroaches]', Balaam thought. He surveyed the devasted battle ground, noting that both sides had pulled back to their bases to regroup. The Fallen had been on this forsaken rock for generations, guarding the Zero Well for the hope that it would bring to the Metaverse. Until a few weeks ago, Balaam would have said the Angels didn't even know about the prophecy.For sure it had been the most boring 10,000 years of his existence. He'd watched his Legion of Fallen carve out a life here, have families, grow old, die, and repeat the cycle. He actually commanded more troops now,