Face of the Enemy

In a distant part of her mind, Vivian thought that getting used to working in loud, chaotic environments was something she never expected to happen. The cacophony of endless battle, of the odd and impossible sound of metal weapons meeting ashen ones and controlled displays of magical blasts were doing little to distract from her work. In fact, they only spurred her on.

A complex array was being drawn in paint on a tablecloth, rough drafts of its script done on the floor around it. Around Vivian, Estelle and the clan’s fateweavers were throwing out ideas on how they were going to cut off this invasion and get their people back.

“If we invert the harmonics, we can push back the efforts of whoever’s opening this path,” one of the dwarven fateweavers, or as they liked to be called aethersmiths, suggested.

“That still has the high risk of cutting off the jungle barrier from us,” Goe countered. “We’re not leaving them there to die.”

“It’s not a hundred percent chance, and if we add some anchor points…”

“We might not need anchor points,” Estelle pointed out as she fiddled with one of her magical gadgets, a series of interlinked rings. “We know that Kiera’s magic lets her interfere with the animating magic and we’ve already come up with a booster to let her do so completely. She knows John and Senka’s auras, so we should be able to use that to hold the barrier in place while we short out this second connection.”

“And can she do both at the same time?” an elderly dwarf asked, his tone gravely serious. “You’ve said it yourself, on her own, your companion needed help to fully neutralize one golem. Trying to do that on a mass scale and maintain a strong link as to not cast the trial barrier into the void might be too much for anyone.”

“Lita,” Goe spoke up before anyone else could speak, “what’s happening in the barrier?”

The catgirl, who had been relaying the events of both the battle outside and in the temple to them, answered, “Um, well, John used some spell that didn’t seem to do anything at first, but it seems to have given them a boost. They’re fighting their way to the archway.”

“They must be trying to use the archway to get back,” Vivian spoke up, her eyes sweeping across her array. “If this invasion is piggy backing off the transitional sequence like you said before, then John negating it might reassert the intended function, sending them back and severing their connection to both locations.”

Goe shared a look with her fellow aethersmiths. “It’s not a bad idea. You have more of an idea of what John might be doing, but we can’t just rely on what might be happening.”

“I know that,” Vivian said. “What I’m suggesting is us moving to support them by mucking up the invader’s magic. Use Kiera’s magic to disrupt theirs both here and in the temple, let John try to shut down their magic at the source of the breach. I think trying to break the connection here might cause us to lose the trial barrier.”

“Might be something that we can do without putting too much on Kiera,” Estelle agreed. “At the very least, stopping the golems from working right will give all of us some more breathing room, right?”

“It doesn’t carry with it the risk of breaking our connection to the trial barrier,” the elder aethersmith agreed, running a hand through his beard. “But there’s no guarantee his efforts will help us. He could sever the connection himself.”

“With no real way to tell him our plan, there’s no way to stop them,” Goe said sadly. “We can only do so much with the drone and the chaos of battle isn’t the best time to try and mime out complex strategies. We can only hope they make the right choices and our efforts aren’t wasted. Let’s get this plan done.”

“A parley?” John couldn’t help but repeat in a strained, incredulous voice.

“Would you prefer to die in combat?” the ashen woman asked, her head tilting to one side, small bits of ash falling out of her hair. Her face stretched into a wide grin, more bits of ash coming loose. “That would be great too. Let this place be cast into the great flames!”

‘She doesn't seem like the negotiating sort,’ Senka thought. ‘She might be the one directing the ash, but not the overall leader.’

Almost as if to confirm the spirit’s thoughts, the figure began to laugh, a crazed and grinding laugh like sandpaper rubbing against itself.

“Oh, to burn in the endless conflict~! Is there no higher calling?” she gushed. While she was distracted, John risked throwing an Observe at her.

While glad the skill worked, John was more than a little annoyed that the most important info, just who this woman worked for, wasn’t shown. Not just absent, but actively blocked by something. And he wasn’t convinced it was because of the unstable connection.

“Why don’t you come closer and say that?” Tok growled out, hands gripping his axe so tightly they were turning white.

“Oh,” Rita’s ashen simulacrum giggled. “Are you too cowardly to come face me? Just like your ancestors, I suppose.”

John grabbed Tok’s shoulder before he could take a step. “Don’t let her bait you.”

“Yes, don’t listen to your friend there,” Rita continued to jibe, and if she had eyes under her bangs, John imagined they were glowing with foul mirth. “Or do you want to be like those spineless runners?”

John could hear Tok’s teeth grind together, but despite his tensed body, he remained in place.

“My ancestors chose life over pointless ****,” Tok growled out. “I don’t know just who you are, or how you’re connected to the old world, but I will not throw my honor aside due to your poisoned tongue.”

Rita let out a sound that John thought was a disappointed whine. It sounded more like chalk scraping on a chalkboard. “Aww, that’s not fun! You looked like you were having such a good time when fighting my golems. Come on! Burn!”

Her hand shot up, a fine mist of ash breaking away. But that paled to the gout of fire that flew towards them. Rowan stepped into its path, her mana wavering but countenance resolute. She brought her sword up and twisted it, the tip circling the area around where the attack would pass.

The flame hit that space and sputtered out as if the air had suddenly been vacuumed away. John felt Rowan’s mana dip more, but she remained steady, gaze locked on Rita. The ashen simulacrum was still, arm extended. Without eyes, it was hard to gauge what the person on the other end of the magical connection was feeling.

Then she began to laugh, nearly doubling over but keeping her face turned towards them, watching them with hidden eyes.

“How do you know that move?” she demanded through her mania. “I know that move! Those foul Lah’men with their damn suffocating magic!”

‘John, we can’t keep this up much longer,’ Senka remarked, her tone serious. ‘We should make a break for the arch. I can keep her distracted. You, Rowan and Tok rush for it.’

John knew better than to argue with her. It was make or break time and they had to go as hard as they could to escape. But Rita’s crazed words echoed in John’s mind. Lah’men was the name of the people that made Rowan’s sword. And presumably created the techniques she was using.

‘Focus on that once we’re back home safe,’ John chided himself, body tensing as he readied for Senka to move. They would only have a second before their enemies adapted to their change in strategy.

The ending of Dark Forest was not a dramatic affair. One second, their mana was flowing together, the next, the flow had stopped. The after effect was more noticeable; as the surge of stolen mana flooded into John, Senka, Rowan and Tok, the latter pair jolted as the unexpected recharge hit them.

Senka dashed towards Rita while John took off in the other direction, shouting, “Head for the arch!”

John did his best to ignore Senka squaring up against Rita as their ashen enemy began to march on them, fire swirling around her hands. He had to contend with the golems standing in their way to the arch. Thankfully, he wasn’t alone and his and Senka’s efforts weren’t going to be in vain.

Tok and Rowan overtook him, weapons ready to clear a path.

“I hope you know what you’re doing!” Rowan shouted as she locked blades with a golem.

“Same idea as before,” John returned as he dodged an attack. “Senka can hold her off.”

“Then let’s not waste any more time,” Tok bellowed as he hacked through a golem, his axe flashing with expended mana. “Let’s get home!”

Spurred on by Tok’s battlecry, John put all his effort into reaching the arch. With Tok and Rowan handling the enemies, and as fire and darkness battled behind them, John locked his eyes on his target. The arch kept billowing ash and smoke, new golems slowly manifesting. Dark Forest had slowed the production due to the mana drain, but now it was beginning to make up for lost time, and if they didn’t capitalize on the gap, they would get overwhelmed by the tide of ash.

And the surf was growing rougher. Tok and Rowan were slowly getting bogged down, strikes making their way past their defences, wearing down their already strained bodies. John himself took a few glancing blows as he danced between the golems, using Rushing Winds to boost his Agility just enough to keep them from scoring any definitive hits.

A strike to his leg nearly caused John to fall but he caught himself, twisting so he could hit his current attacker with a quick blast of wind. Rowan beat him to the punch, sword punching through the golem’s head with a quick thrust.

The flash of gratitude John felt was quickly replaced by worry as Rowan’s save came at the cost of her taking a blow to her back by an ashen axe.

“Go!” she shouted at him through gritted teeth, turning to counterattack.

The arch loomed close, only a few golems right between him and it, and John threw all the mana he could spare into his wind spirit, releasing a respectable gust to push them out of his way. The blast cleared a way and John poured all he could into reaching the arch.

The ashen smoke began to sting John’s eyes as he neared it; the heat, both real and arcane, burning his skin, single digit damage ticks beginning to fill his vision. He threw his hand out, Hex ready to fire. At the edge of his awareness, he began to feel other mana signatures, distorted by the heat.

Then the magic streaming from the arch shifted and a wave of horror bled through his link with Senka.

‘John, above you!’

He looked up to see a stream of ash flying right towards him. Rita’s head and arm formed out of the ash, her grin wide. John tried to evade, but the suddenness of this change and the speed of the ash caught John flat-footed. Before he could get out of the way or reach the arch, Rita’s ashen hand grabbed his wrist.

And everything dissolved. In an instant, John wasn’t in the courtyard, but was floating in a void full of wind driven ash. The ash swirled into shapes: a small blue haired girl, ranks of dwarves standing at attention, a sole dwarf at some kind of table, arm raised while holding a hammer. The girl before a large pillar, searing heat burning his hands in time as she was made to touch it, a flash of rage pounding through his head.

As John tried to make sense of the scenes flashing around him, he felt a familiar mana reach out to him. Kiera’s slightly hesitant but determined presence called out to him like a lighthouse in a storm driven sea. John found himself moving towards her, small echoes of Vivian and Estelle’s mana coming through along with a few he wasn’t familiar with.

It was a lifeline back to Higaisha, reaching out to them through all the chaos, and he let it lead him forward. The void was now a desert of ash, his feet sinking deep, pulling him down, but his drive to survive, to guide Senka, Rowan and Tok home, and the support from everyone on the other side kept him from faltering.

He could almost feel the cool stone of the arch when what felt like a hand grasped his wrist. It was cool and calloused, reaching up from the ash below. But it didn’t feel like it was trying to pull him down; it felt like it was trying to climb out. Foreign memories flashed across John’s vision, this time in perfect clarity: a stone chamber lit by crimson flames, unbearable heat scorching his skin, unfamiliar words etched into metal tables, burned fingers tracing them as a strained, hoarse voice read them aloud.

Then John felt the stone under his fingers and Hex fired into the arch. For a second, John saw it and the courtyard beyond it, before he felt the telltale pull of barrier transition and everything faded to white.

The last thing he felt was the hand on his wrist, **** to maintain its hold. In the last moment, a second hand joined the grip, straining to hold on as he was ripped away.