Three poorly aimed arrows sunk into the corpse of number ten as Belladonna rolled off of him, flipped onto the air and landed on two new air platforms. She sunk into a sprinters start and shot forwards like a bullet.

Arrow after arrow flew her way, but tracking her movements became next to impossible. She could step on the air mid-sprint to stop and change direction, she could redirect any jump that she wanted to completely ruin any attempt to calculate a trajectory and she could create her own leverage whenever she wanted.

She became like a ball in the world’s most insane pinball machine, bouncing off of literally everything and nothing at the same time. The only reason none of them had become number eleven yet, was because Belladonna was using them as training dummies to practice her 3D fighting.

When you could push off of thin air and attack from any angle, all of the previous training of martial arts went out the window, for both sides. Attacks became too difficult to predict when your opponent could turn any dodge or any movement into a new strike.

At one point, Belladonna ran towards one of them and leapt into the air, thrusting both of her feet out in a devastating drop kick. The man crossed his arms across his face, bracing himself against the attack just in time, only for it to never land.

Instead Belladonna formed air platforms beneath her feet, letting her kick those as she planted her hand on the ground and spun like a break-dancer. Swinging her legs around her as she swept his out from underneath him.

A high strike suddenly became low, and there was nothing he could do to stop it as he tumbled to the ground.

Belladonna immediately leapt onto him, pummelling her elbow into his face three times, enough to shatter his nose and dislodge some teeth, before she curled her body behind her arm and generated another shield to block the projectiles.

But while the man’s face looked like a rotten jack-o-lantern that had been left in the sun for 6 weeks after Halloween, he was still letting out a few gurgling breaths. So he was not yet number eleven. Not until the assassin got involved.

The hair on the back of Belladonna’s neck stood on end, forcing her to quickly shift her head to the side just as a dagger pierced the air where her head had been. It cut through her ear and sliced open her cheek on the way past, before stopping its flight in the chest of the man she had beaten to a pulp.

A moment later the owner of the knife dropped down from the trees, only to get a kick to the face as Belladonna sent him flying and rolled away from him at the same time.

She glared at the pumpkin man, who had stopped gurgling thanks to the knife in his heart, before she let out a deep sigh. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

"Eleven." She muttered, before rising slowly to her feet and facing the assassin, who was doing the same.

It was a short woman dressed like some kind of ninja, with the full black clothing that made her clearly stand out in the green of the forest, and a mask that covered everything but her eyes and her dark, pointed ears.

A dark elf assassin... How original.

Belladonna had to stop herself from rolling her eyes as she glared at the ninja,

"That was very rude of you, you know. Where did you even come from? Aren’t you a little late to the party?"

She asked with a cocky smirk, hiding her annoyance, despite the fact she already knew the answer. The road split the forest in two, and the ambushers were hidden on both sides of the road.

Belladonna had only been terrorising one half of the road, and had left the other side for the rest of the guards to deal with whilst she had her fun. That is where this ninja had come from, barging into the party uninvited.

Not just that, but they had daggers made of a strange material. It was a type of magical metal, most likely to conduct skills or hold enchantments better. Iron and mundane metals were easy for her to manipulate with her bloodline, but it became much more difficult and even impossible when it came to magical metals. Ditanium, for example, she could never manipulate.

On the plus side, this gave her another opportunity to test out something she had been thinking about. She just had to be careful. She wanted her bakers dozen to end with a special kill, and since this rude woman had made pumpkin boy number Eleven, she had to keep the assassin alive so she didn’t ruin it.

Well... She didn’t have to, but it was more fun to and better practice.

Another dagger flew across the space between them and Belladonna immediately melted into the shadows to avoid it. She sprung from the assassin’s shadow, her fist already flying towards their head, only for it to be swallowed up by a cloud of smoke that suddenly appeared.

Her fist smashed into something, and a second later a cracked log of wood flew from the smoke and smashed into a nearby tree, shattering into splinters.

Belladonna chuckled, tilting her head towards where the Ninja now stood, and locked eyes with her opponent. This was definitely going to be fun.

They glared at each other for a few seconds, before moving at the exact same moment. Their forms became blurs, as their ghostly speed was perfectly matched. The assassin came at her with a flurry of swipes with her twin daggers, which Belladonna weaved between and lashed out with her own attacks.

Punches, kicks, elbows and palm strikes. She hit nothing but air as the ninja dipped and dodged them all, her fists barely touching the thin black cloth that covered their body.

Yet Belladonna didn’t grow annoyed or frustrated. The more she missed and the more effort she had to put in, the wider her sadistic smile became, until finally she landed a blow. It wasn’t a punch or a kick.

It was a jab with two of her fingers, like the tip of a spear, right into the assassins shoulder.

They leapt backwards, instantly creating space between them, before frowning as they looked down at the arm that hung limply by their side.