The Ironscale Charger hit the ground with a wet crunch and didn't get back up.
Brittany pulled her blade free, flicked the ichor off the edge in a single practiced motion, and exhaled. Her arms burned and her mana reserves were low enough to feel it in her teeth, and it was the best she'd felt in months.
Trisha lowered her hands from across the clearing. The last of her ranged volley fizzled out, the air still shimmering where the bolts had punched through the Charger's flank to pin it in place for Brittany's killing blow. She was breathing hard, sweat cutting lines through the dust on her face, and she was smiling.
"Clean," Trisha said.
"Clean," Brittany agreed.
They'd been hunting for three days.
Three days of waking up without a comm buzzing in their ears, without Ash's voice telling them which zone to farm, which angles to play for the camera drones, which fights to pick based on content value rather than experience yield.
Three days of just being fighters.
