Stolen Lives: A LitRPG/GameLit Novel (The Underhill Chronicles Book 1) Keith Ahrens (best e reader for epub txt) 📖

to connect to each other or any bones. The air around the corpse has gone stale immediately and fills with a rotten meat odor.

“What the fuck is that?” Haynes asks in a hushed voice.

23

The rest of the night passes in a slow crawl. I take one of the few healing stones we have left and use it on both Haynes' ankle and where the bullet hit his leg. Lucky for him, the round passed right through the meat of his thigh and missed all the major blood vessels on its way out.

Turning my attention to my broken ribs, I decide to try out my new magic again. After few hours of rest, I find I have a little more energy than usual. But this energy feels a bit different, but somehow normal all the same. It’s like I’ve had it all along, but never noticed it until now. Turns out, broken ribs are an easy fix with my new power. It proved tougher to take the shackles off my wrist without a key. But, just like that, the new energy is gone, leaving behind a small empty place in the back of my mind.

“So, what happened to you?” I ask Haynes after I recover from my energy expenditure.

“Well, you idiots went running through the camp like a herd of elephants, and then left. I heard the crashes from the forest and went to go check it out. Must have snapped my ankle on some damn rabbit burrow and hit my head on the way down. I only woke up a few minutes ago and heard you guys fighting. The rest you pretty much know.”

I nod affirmatively. “The question is, what do we do now?”

“I have no idea. Des and Thorn are the only two that know anything about magic, and they’re trapped in that fog. Go see if you can wake up Nian; he's from this world. Maybe he has some idea.”

Already moving on to Nian, I stay quiet as I take some time to heal his burns first. Fresh out of my magical energy (my new blue tattoo is already black from healing my ribs), I have to use a stone. Electrical burns are tricky; they can look really minor on the outside, but underneath, in the muscles and organs, things can cook like a pot roast. About half an hour later, I'm finished and so is the stone. Only one left now.

I shake him awake and call his name. He comes to, slow and groggy, and sits up. He shakes his head like a dog does upon waking.

We quickly bring him up to speed on what happened since he got caught in the lightning blast. He gets to his feet, a little unsteady, and walks over to the remains of what used to be Jesse.

“Doppelganger,” he states with disgust. “Shapeshifting assassins and bounty hunters. The elves enjoy using them to sow discord and kidnap humans from their world. Very tough to kill. Good job humans.” He spits on the corpse. Who knew dogs could spit?

“But what happened to Jesse, then?” I ask. I kneel next to the body, or whatever it is, and take a closer look. Rot and decay have set in at a surprising rate. I take a stick and lift one hand up to inspect it. Small suction cup-like organs are on each fingertip. Even stranger, the digits seem webbed to the next and contain an extra joint. The skin feels spongy and rubber-like. Gross.

“Doppelgangers try to take their bounties alive if they are worth more that way. I suspect Jesse is still alive but hidden somewhere nearby. The doppelgangers can use their magics to turn their bounty into almost anything they want. When the sun rises, we will hunt for him,” Nian says, still staring at the corpse.

I turn back to my inspection of the body. Underneath its hand, covered in a blackish ooze, I see the small copper rod. I push it out into the open with the stick and reveal the lightning rod he'd used on us earlier. A thick, black leather band wraps around it for a handle, and the clear crystal glows faintly with trapped electrical static. Strange, thinly etched runes and symbols decorate its length. I pick it up with two fingers. I definitely have to wash this thing off before I mess around with it. Rotten doppelganger-ooze does nothing for its resale value.

I realize that Nian and Haynes have still been talking this whole time.

“Sorry guys, I missed that last part, but I found something.” I show them the lightning rod. “This is what he was using to shoot those lightning bolts.”

“Great, more magic,” Haynes says sarcastically and shakes his head. “Nian says his tribe's Shamans told stories that all magic fades at the sunrise. If we wait until then, the magic effects of the fog should go away, since the person who cast the magic is dead, and there is no one to renew the spells.” He nods toward the corpse.

“Well, I for one, have no plans to go back to sleep. Sunrise can't be more than a few hours away,” I say.

“Agreed. We'll wait it out together then; I don’t want to split the Pack any further and finding Jesse will be easier with Thirax on the hunt,” states Nian.

Haynes also nods, and we settle down to wait, well away from the fog and the rotting corpse. It's a long few hours, tedious but uneventful. Nothing to do but think. Yet, I do my best to not think about the acts I've committed in the past few days. Kill or be killed, right?

My first few years as a Medic were the toughest, as far as casual and senseless deaths go. I continued to study and read up on all the new medical advances and techniques, working as hard as I could to save as many people as possible. Even one death was too many. In the end, it didn’t really matter. There are always some