Pirin batted aside Ethelvaed’s sword and struck him in the gut with a Shattered Palm. His Essence flowed freely, and its purity made it stronger—and the unstable explosion of pure-aspect Aes even more violent. Ethelvaed flew into the air, straight up.

The man smashed through the ceiling above—which was the floor of the control room and oversight platform.

More Weavelings poured into the atrium, enclosing on him from all sides. There were fifty of them so far, and they kept coming. They carried spears and shields, and an ostal company worker commanded them, calling out and giving them orders.

Pirin slipped his mask on and glanced at Gray. “We should join him before they get us.”

I’ll meet you up there! She swooped down on Ethelvaed’s horse, driving it to the ground. It kicked out at her with its hooves and struck her in the wing, but it was a glancing blow. Their Reyad projected only a dull impact in Pirin’s arm.

Pirin bent down to his knees, then leapt up to the control room, passing through the hole Ethelvaed had torn.

Pirin’s Essence was stronger, so his enhanced body was stronger. His channels were more real, so they could pour Essence into his muscles better. He sprang up to the control room with a leap, pushing from below with wind.

As soon as he passed through the hole in the control room’s floor, Ethelvaed slashed. His sword sliced across Pirin’s chest, leaving only a light cut, but it still stung.

Then, the man kicked. His foot hit Pirin in the gut, flinging Pirin into a set of sloped wood panels along the wall. Sheets of parchment and production notes fluttered into the air, but Pirin pushed them aside with a gust of wind.

“Get out!” he yelled to the workers, who looked on with awe and fear. “Run! Go!”

Ethelvaed turned his sword over and stabbed in a reverse grip, and though Pirin matched his speed easily, now, the sword plunged into the bare wood hard enough to shatter it. Ethelvaed swept his sword to the side, and Pirin blocked it with his own blade. Their Reign clashed for a second. It matched, then popped, fading away and leaving them both with bare steel.

Ethelvaed pushed, knocking Pirin onto his back with sheer strength. Pirin kicked out with a blast of wind, hitting the man in the knees. They both flew to opposite sides of the room.

“Gray…” Pirin whispered. “Where are you?”

I’m coming! she replied. Coming right up!

A blur of grey feathers rushed past the control room windows. Pirin scrambled away, and just in time. Gray looped around, then tucked her wings and smashed through the windows. The impact sent glass shards whirling into the room, and she gave a flutter of her wings to stop herself, blasting Ethelvaed into the far wall.

“Good hit,” Pirin said, running across the room to her. He glanced back at the panels at the front end of the control room—the panels overlooking the main atrium. A windstone still sat in the center of the panel. “Don’t break that. We’ll need that.”

We need to live, first!

“I think we’ve got enough to make a predictive model, don’t you think?” Pirin asked. “Care to be my eyes?”

Yes! Gray exclaimed. I’ve got this!

Pirin reached over and plucked Göttrur out of the saddle pouch. The little fox clung to his shoulder, yipping and snarling at Ethelvaed. “Alright, bud,” Pirin whispered. “Do your thing.”

Ethelvaed pushed himself up out of the debris. He brushed himself off and spat on the floor, then flourished his sword. He whistled, calling for his horse, but horses couldn’t fly. Pirin had time to face him while his Familiar was trying to navigate up to the control room.

Pirin took off his mask and shut his eyes, and Gray projected a sense of sight to him through their Reyad, still allowing him to perceive his surroundings. When Ethelvaed charged, Pirin knew where the man’s sword would be, and he deflected it.

He fought defensively, retreating and dodging Ethelvaed’s strikes while drawing on the Memory Chain. Fortifying his soul with a technique like the Fracturenet, he dragged heaps of memories out—what the Chain deemed relevant to Ethelvaed.

Ethelvaed was strong, but more importantly, he valued strength. He was a horselord, and he fought like one—this wasn’t the first time an elven king had fought a Plainsparan. He used wind, but not for movement, but to strengthen himself. A poor use of the aspect, Pirin thought, but he fed it to the Chain nonetheless.

When he drew the memories out, Göttrur sorted them into neat parcels, and Pirin compacted and condensed them into a predictive model. He had everything he needed.

He opened his eyes and faced Ethelvaed, projection a new sense of confidence. Before the man swiped, Pirin’s model warned him and told him exactly where the blade would fall. Pirin stepped to the side and countered, slashing across Ethelvaed’s gut. It left a slight mark, but nothing life-threatening. Not to a Blaze.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“Alright, Gray,” Pirin said as he blocked and casually deflected a swipe from Ethelvaed that he’d foreseen from a mile away. “We’ll need to create an opening. You’re with me?”

I’m with you! she replied. She swatted at Ethelvaed with a wing, attacking in unison with Pirin’s thrust.

They pushed Ethelvaed across the control room. The entire room was fifty paces across, but they crossed it in a second. Pirin kept mostly on the offensive. He tried launching Whisper Hitches, but Ethelvaed was still fast enough to recognize a threat. Whether he turned away or swung at Pirin’s hand or launched a technique, he found a way to disrupt Pirin, even on the back foot.

And, no matter how good Pirin’s predictive model was, Ethelvaed was still physically stronger. Pirin locked their blades in a bind, but Ethelvaed spun him around and flung him into the wall—right beside a doorway to an exterior hallway. Pirin fell to the floor, gasping for breath.

Ethelvaed swung at Göttrur. His sword caught the fox’s antlers and flung it off to the side, and as soon as Göttrur lost contact with Pirin, the predictive model started collapsing. Pirin scooped up the fox. Aside from a chipped antler, Göttrur was alright. When they made contact again, the model of Ethelvaed inside Pirin’s mind stabilized.

Gray pushed Ethelvaed back, swatting at him with her wings and forcing him to retreat. Pirin sent her mental suggestions based on the model, allowing her to dodge his swipes and land hits that would fling him.

Pirin didn’t feel the dagger lifting out of his belt and slipping away until it was too late. He whirled around, deflecting a swipe from Ethelvaed, and found Lady Neria standing right behind him. She hid in the doorway, clinging to the shadows.

Once she had the dagger in-hand, she held it up and pressed the gemstone down. “This is my army!”

The runes on the dagger’s blade resonated with the release of Essence, ringing out. The Weavelings in the atrium fell to their knees, clamping their hands over their ears and contorting, like someone was continually electrocuting them with lightning. They wailed in pain and terror.

A pang of anger shot through Pirin’s gut. He flung his hand out and blasted Lady Neria with a Winged Fist. She slammed the control room door shut in front of herself, but Pirin’s blast ripped the wooden gate off its hinges and flung it into her. She crashed into the opposite wall of the hallway, unmoving, and Pirin ripped the dagger from her hand with a gust of wind.

He was about to strike a killing blow—one more concentrated Winged Fist would be enough to take out a mortal—when Ethelvaed lunged, nearly stabbing through Pirin’s spine. Pirin whirled his sword, forming a steel cage around himself. He parried the sword just in time.

But when he turned back to Lady Neria, she was gone. She’d scampered away, or someone had dragged her away, and Pirin didn’t know which—nor did he care. He snatched the dagger back up and shoved it into his belt.

He had to defeat Ethelvaed.

He prodded the model, sending it the suggestion of a Whisper Hitch. Göttrur sifted through the parcels of possibilities and picked out one.

In Pirin’s mind, the misty grey form of Ethelvaed played out a series of swipes, and Pirin led him on, manipulating the battle until he created an opening for long enough to use the Whisper Hitch.

Take off the mask. Palm strike to the chest—Shattered Palm. Another one to his thigh. Activate the Fracturenet. Strike his sword hard and fast, knocking it up. Block the instinctive counter-attack, no matter how strong or hard he swipes, or how much Reign he uses.

There won’t be another shot.

Nynhar shatters, but it won’t matter. Strike his blade with another Shattered Palm and fling it to the side. Put your mask back on and pin him with a gust of wind, then activate the Whisper Hitch.

The timing had to be perfect.

Within a second, Pirin unleashed the combination of attacks and blocks. His own sword shattered halfway up the blade, but Ethelvaed lost his sword entirely.

And once Pirin held the orb of grey mist perfectly in his hand, he had everything he needed. He drove a spike of Essence straight through the center. It wouldn’t be enough to overwhelm a Blaze’s willpower or scramble his mind, but an attack to a Blaze’s soul was an attack to their spirit. And Ethelvaed’s spirit was a house of cards.

Pirin had just flicked out the bottom card.

Ethelvaed screamed and collapsed, clutching his gut. His runebond tattoos glowed bright gold. His channels and spirit were collapsing, and soon, he’d be no better than a Kindling-stage Embercore.

Ethelvaed looked Pirin in the eyes. “What did you do?”

“You hate Embercores so much, huh?” Pirin prepared a Winged Fist, in case Ethelvaed tried anything. “You can try being one.”

Gray nattered, almost like a chuckle. Pirin didn’t find anything about it terribly funny, but he didn’t comment.

Ethelvaed shouted in rage. “First, you rob my family blind while my father dies, and now, you ridicule me with this torment?” He grabbed a shard of Nynhar in his bare hand and charged at Pirin. He seemed too slow, too weak. His enhanced body was failing him, but he was still trying to kill Pirin.

Pirin, still holding the hilt and a jagged foot-length of Nynhar’s blade, batted Ethelvaed’s hand aside, then drove the jagged tip through the man’s neck.

With a few gurgles and gasps, Ethelvaed collapsed on the floor. After a few more seconds, he stopped writhing.

Pirin held up the hilt of Nynhar and stared at it. He’d held this sword as long as he could remember, and it had been a gift from Kalénier. He couldn’t just leave it in a heap of shards on the ground.

He opened his void pendant and shovelled as many of the sword’s shards as he could find into it, then placed the hilt atop them gently and sealed it inside the pendant.

What now? Gray asked. She eyed the control dagger cautiously.

“We have a speech to make,” Pirin said. He drew the golden weapon from his belt and walked back to the shattered front windows of the control room. He ran his hand along the sloped wooden panels beneath the windowsills, brushing glass away.

At the very center of the panels, he found the main broadcasting windstone.

He cleared his throat, then pushed a gust of wind into it. Normally, someone would pump bellows into it to activate it, but he couldn’t see any still intact, and he didn’t need any. As soon as the windstone crackled, he knew it was active.

The entire facility could hear him, now.

“My name is Pirin,” he said. His voice echoed back through him, windstones broadcasting it through the central atrium. “And I’m here to help.”