Elurial.

29th of Ianua, 1492.

Southern Kasian Mountains.

6:19 PM.

***

I couldn't help but think this was bullshit. My troops were out there in the snow among the beasts and mounted bandits, with my fucking truck, and here I was, in a cave, bundled up close to some hot rocks with a brooding giant of a woman. She looked up a few times in the… however long we were here- I refused to look at the time and get even more pissed- but this time, the grim expression was missing from her face as she turned her eyes up to the stone again.

"Finally." She stood with a sigh. "Toril's done."

That was it. That was all she said before she stepped deeper into the cave to use her crazy magic to barrel through the dead end.

She didn't even cool it down for me.

"You're lucky I'm half-human." I gasped through the smoke after blowing my way through with air, then silently thanked Amun for the lessons in elemental manipulation.

"I'm surprised you're with me and not Opal." Roheisa quipped.

'Finally, some words!' I thought, uncaring if they were meant to poke fun at me.

"Do you like her?" She asked.

"Like is a strong word. Attracted is the one. I can't help but be attracted to strong women." I shrugged. "I hear Amun shares the same trait."

"You can add aloof Vampyr to that list."

"Gyahahaha! Is that jealousy I hear?"

"Hardly." Roheisa scoffed. "Just an observation."

"My opinion..." I began and received a quick, 'no.' But pressed on anyway. "Opposites attract and all that. But more importantly, she's broken, just like he is. He has a soft spot for the downtrodden."

Roheisa rolled her eyes. "What do you know?"

"I know Amun saw some scary shit in his past life!" I stomped forward. "And, honestly, I don't think he's found a way to cope with it all. I think it's contained under lock and key. Zakira has gone through some scary shit in this life. She's been hunted like a monster for years. Alone, in the Nonusian Darkworld and on the surface for years. She definitely hasn't found a way to cope with it all, so I can give her some slack if she wants to act aloof.

"You, on the other hand." I scoffed. "What do you know?"

She halted mid-step, leading me to believe she was actually going to respond in a meaningful way. But alas... "I know that it's time for you to walk away."

I felt my lips rise into a snarl as she began to strip. Roheisa was a literal woman of steel. But even if she were half-orc she would've been large for someone her age. Not that I gave a shit. I waltzed right up to her and looked up into her dead little eyes. "You've got a real shitty attitude, you know that?"

Ignoring me entirely, the bitch sidestepped me to wade into the magma pool. "I won't be responsible for what happens to you after," she murmured in passing.

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"You never fucking were!" I spat back. "Amun is! And I won't be dying without his permission!"

"Your faith in him is strong."

I recoiled at once and shook my head in disappointment. More, in pain. "Yours isn't?"

"I am not a pious person," she said, to some surprise. Then remained silent for a few curious moments. "But Amun is family. My trust in him is unbreakable, and trust is another form of faith."

"Then you understand that I'm free to do as I please." I proudly huffed. "I'll stay here and watch the iron volcano erupt as much as I damn well want!"

"This isn't just an iron volcano," she said flatly. Then turned and waded into the lava pool. "It's a Vulcan Heart."

I rolled my eyes in annoyance. By this point, I was done with names and nearly done with her. Although I still gave her some privacy by using the grace of twilight to slip into the shadows. When I turned back I saw her waist deep in magma, heating the dull-gray colorations of her magically infused skin to a bright orange. With a great heave, she blew a gust of air onto the bubbling surface, hardening a plate of igneous rock before she lifted an open palm and brought it down with a hard smack.

"Come out!" She smacked the hardened surface once and then twice more. "I know you're in there!"

Over and over, she kept smacking until eventually, an earth-shattering growl responded with a threat to collapse the mountain around us. I believed it to be an earthquake until a pair of bright orange horns breached the surface. Then, I watched in morbid fascination as a beast covered in obsidian-like plates of matted fur rose from the glowing pool to take on the form of some type of weird water buffalo.

A spitting noise pulled my eyes to Roheisa just as a chunk of hot steel pelted the creature's side. Then it turned its red, beady, malice-fueled eyes towards the giant of a woman. Its curved horns dipped dangerously low, sinking into the cloud of volatile gasses streaming from its nostrils as it pawed its iron hooves into the pool.

Undeterred, Roheisa did the same. Coupled with a few more globs of simmering magma for good measure. "This heart is mine!" She snarled.

There were no signs to precede the charge. All I saw was a wave of hot magma rise to splatter against the ceiling before a shockwave blew the orange wall apart. I dipped behind cover and emerged a second later to see Roheisa's arm hooked around the creature's horn before it thrashed against the walls and into the magma, attempting to drown her, the volcanic princess.

Up and down, Roheisa lifted her steel-imbued arms and pummeled them into the creature repeatedly, filling the cavern with the sounds of sloshing lava and feral screams that left me hot and on the verge of losing myself to my fury as the magnificent display of power reached its climax.

With an animalistic roar, Roheisa punched through the beast's thick hide and began fishing. With another scream, she withdrew an orange fleshy mass clenched tightly in her fist and screamed again, bringing a sharpened edge of a steel arm down on the creature's neck. Thus ending the battle gloriously.

Still growling with effort, Roheisa crouched, pulling her hands towards her mouth to begin gnawing and tearing at the heart like a feral beast until all that remained were crumbs to simmer atop her flesh. Then, she grabbed the head.

Screams- feral, blood-curdling screams echoed through the cavern soon after she pulled the decapitated head on like a hood. She began thrashing, throwing lava and steel everywhere as the head solidified into a solid obsidian helm; and dissolved, burned away into a cloud of ashes and soot to reveal those same glowing orange horns, swept forward from a steel-gray helm streaked with veins of lava and crystalline hair, and hateful red eyes that stared embers into my soul

In other words, it was my cue to rage. But not with my own.

Not this time.

"Amun." I began. "You share everything else. So, how about you unlock that tower and share a little rage?"

Just as Roheisa's horned helm bent low, a mote of darkness surrounded by golden light drifted from above. I reached out for it as if it were my lifeline and grasped it tightly; right before Roheisa rammed through me.

Like a minotaur of molten rock, crystal, and steel, Roheisa charged through me and the stone I was standing in front of without a hint of her momentum stopping, using my body as a cave sweeper until she emerged in the snow to fling me off her horns, sending me tumbling down the mountain helplessly.

It felt like I hit every part of my body by the time I landed. Breathing felt like being stabbed by a thousand rusty knives, and I was so… cold. So… unnervingly calm, lying there on that dreary mountain; feeling the warm embrace of the setting sun glide across my skin.

"A...mun." I heard my words as a distant gurgle and somehow formed a single thought regarding my disbelief of him being able to fight in this state. "I... know y- ou... won't... let- me... die."

I heard myself say it, even as the darkness clouded my vision. But I never stopped believing, for a gilded horizon could be seen beyond that wall of black. And it beckoned to me.