The flames continue to grow unheeded. Ulx and his army of goblins and Caldri are immediately trapped in the city, and at a glance Lavinia can tell the barrier of flames will be far more difficult to pierce than the barrier that lulled them into this trap in the first place.

With [Inspect] the magnitude of mana surging through and out of the fiendish Jelvun atop the tower is not lost on her. Quick on her feet she escapes the flames seizing the wall and swallowing both Kimpe and Simak, their bodies fade to ash before their screams can even escape their throats.

He doesn’t care about his demons. Lavinia seperates the Soul Crystals she’s gathered from the glob of blood trailing after her, she still felt near the top of her strength even after the pressure from the very demons that have met their demise in Jelvun’s flames so she pocketed an excess before absorbing one for good measure.

Ulx took to the air, his body surging with mana but not nearly as much as what was spouting off of Jelvun. As she approached him and the army gathered under him a blizzard wind appeared out of nowhere, slapping away the scorching heat threatening to scald and boil demons and goblins in their armour.

His hands took ice from the sudden blizzard, guiding it around his army the flames along the walls continued to rise and Jelvun’s laugh swelled through the inferno of his melting tower. Ulx glances down at his army and muttered something even Lavinia’s ears couldn’t pick up in the swirl of fire and ice.

Suddenly the cool winds wrapped themselves around Lavinia, she felt them cling onto her body but not restrict, only preserve her inward heat from the infernal pit Jelvun was conjuring.

“Hold them back!” Ulx commands before climbing further in the air.

For a moment Lavinia’s is confused, the Kimpe and Simak were all incinerated by Jelvun’s spell weren’t they? Then the goblins and Caldri surged toward a gathering mob of burning corpses, Kimpe and Simak possessed by fire itself moved against the army.

Lavinia curses magic’s versatility as she glared up at Jelvun. Ulx moves against him, magic coursing through his body as he fires a flurry of ice spikes and casts a hail of storm above their heads, raining down ice that melts as soon as it touches the ground for more than a long second.

Even her glob of blood was boiling, threatening to evaporate to nothing and straining her fine control over Essence to keep it in liquid form. Seeing the goblin and Caldri army take on the flame resurrected fiends, Lavinia quickly decides to face the largest threat and with that thought her glob of blood splits into seven long spears. Sharp, solid and very pointy.

“Crimson Blink!” shifting through space Lavinia quickly placed herself on the opposing, tilted and burning tower that belonged to Ulx. She dug her claws in and took advantage of the slope to climb while Ulx and Jelvun went at it.

The fact he’s still laughing even as Ulx pressures him worries her, the fire engulfing him never ceases even as Ulx washes him over with blizzard winds and hail.

Once Lavinia’s at the highest point she can manage without giving herself up to the fire she watches their battle with squinted eyes and a bitten lip, looking for an opportunity to fire any one of her seven blood spears into the fiends head.

Another thing that worries her even more so than Jelvun’s seeming invulnerability to Ulx’s attacks is the absence of the person she’s present for— Promethus.

She doesn’t let it distract her though and before long she finds an opening, right where his Jelvun’s second, wrinkled face sits behind his head. She fires two of her spears for good measure and they split through the heated air with the might of her Essence behind them.

Jelvun notices them before they’re close, or at least his back-face does as its wrinkles open to reveal fierce eyes. More wrinkles give way as Jelvun’s head grows, extending to allow his second jaw open and roar.

The strange face ignites her spears from the inside, imploding them before they even have a chance to reach it. But Lavinia’s been watching and her grip on the Essence in the blood she’s captured is more than it’s ever been.

With a wave of her hand she seizes all the shattered pieces of her blood spears, multitudes of them in different sizes thanks to the explosion. The five spears hanging at her back lose consistency but it’s a good sacrifice as with a flick of her wrists the many shards fire into Jelvun’s second face.

She hears it scream agony over the winds and howling flames and smiles with deep satisfaction. With [Inspect] constantly active it doesn’t go past her notice how there are separate channels and pathways for the two faces and the wrinkled face demands more in response to its agony.

Jelvun’s flames lose their intensity all around as the second face continues to grow and more of Jelvun’s already massive head extends to accommodate it. [Inspect] reveals the second face cannibalizing more of Jelvun’s pathways to feed itself and as its face begins to smoothen out, Lavinia understands.

“Ulx! That’s Pro-”

“Enough!” the second face bellows, sending out a blast that causes explosions in every single attack Ulx has been raining down on him, including Ulx himself. The explosion costs him an arm but no more as he quickly puts distance between the strange amalgamation and himself.

He approaches Lavinia on his tilted tower, panting and gritting his teeth from the agony of a lost arm, a pain Lavinia knows well. Together they watch as Jelvun, or more accurately, the second face grows in size, the flames around the melting tower recede into his body and feed the disgusting exodus.

“I think that’s Promethus…” Ulx says beside her, looking on with just as much disgust.

“How didn’t you recognize…it?”

“They were two separate people when I fought them, not, not this.”

Lavinia shrugs, “This makes it easier then.” she leaps off the building, letting herself fall head first to the ground but with her eyes fixed at the base of Promethus’ tower.

With a thought her spears slice through the air at it, crashing through the base and severing what supports are left. “Crimson Blink…Reais Smite!”

Materialized safely at the base, her fist connects with the tottering structure. The entire thing trembles as it begins to crumble under it’s own weight. Lavinia quickly retrieves her Blood Spears and dashes away as Promethus crashes down.

“Promethus!” She calls out to the smouldering wreakage, “I know you’re not dead, come out, I have many questions for you to answer. But first, where is my GroveStaff?”

Sure enough, Promethus wasn’t dead. The rubble shifted and sunk into lava as he burns his way out to the top. Lavinia didn’t let it phase her, Ulx hovered above the site, the round shield he used in their fight was around him now and far more complex with more moving parts. He also had his spear.

She had aerial support and there’s very few things better than that.

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Flames rose out of the lava pit that used to be rubble, carrying with them Jelvun’s disfigured form as the second head is now the first and superior, sticking out of the skull until Jelvun himself looks like an overgrown tumour salivating as he struggled to protest.

“This…not what we agreed…” his voice made barely a sound and Promethus, now with the smooth face of a human scowled down at his surroundings, completely ignoring the protests of the demon he’s subsumed.

They’re all the same. Humans. Lavinia decides with a snarl, “Return it, now!” Her claws flash out, radiating Essence as she prepared to cut down the fiend with all she has.

The Promethus-Jelvun hybrid stood on odd, backwards legs. He stretched his four arms, swinging and accessing the many fingers as he rolled his neck, pressing Jelvun’s shrunken face into itself.

Lavinia could scarcely believe her eyes as the Kimpe quickly began to adopt features of the fiery human, the four arms rearranged muscle, straightening a hunched back and lengthening the overall structure of their amalgamation.

An oblong rock as heavy as the Stelc fell out of a portal and struck Promethus on the head, driving his floating body back into the pit of lava from whence he came and flattening the gathered debris from the tower’s collapse.

Lavinia gasped, startled by Ulx’s decisive aggression but he must have seen something she failed to because he yells wide eyed at her, “Get ready!”

A blinding orange blaze cut clean through the rock, boiling it to lava as Promethus pushed it apart. His eyes settle on Lavinia for a moment, dark unlike the blaze outlining his Kimpe forged body. His lips twitch as a spark of interest alights in his eyes.

Lavinia knows that look, it’s a human look. She doesn’t hesitate or speak, instead three Blood Spears burst out at him to test his defence. Promethus slaps one away and shatters another but fails to extinguish the third as at the last moment, Lavinia turns it fluid.

It snakes out toward every open orfice she can spot, she grits her teeth and curses as his body simply flares in intensity and boils the blood out of existence.

Still, it’s more than enough to give Ulx an opening. He slices down with an blade where his blown up arm was, a clone of him stabs with a spear as well, or maybe it’s the other way around. Either way, Promethus absorbs both hits, allowing the ice blade to slide through him only to melt instantly on the other side. The spear sticks out of his kidney, he grabs it with one of his arms but before he can do anything one the Ulx explodes in frost.

Lavinia darts around them in a circle, unwilling to stay in one place as she observes the smog of frost and steam fall with [Inspect]. She spots Ulx still in the smog cloud and frowns, it’s been more than a second but with the cover of the smog it’s long enough for him to get away.

Convincing herself he’ll be safe, Lavinia condensces Essence and releases a series of [Wave Shot]. Her attacks explode and slice through the smog in tandem with one another, sending ripples through the air, ground and anything else in the way.

As she hoped, Ulx drops out of the smog, bleeding profusely from one of his gut but otherwise fine as he pivots midair and releases an intense Tribeam from all his eyes. The blast sweeps away the smog and actually succeeds in blasting Promethus in the air.

He swivels from the blow before righting himself, he scowls down at Ulx but quickly returns to examining his environment. Lavinia growls, “He’s not concerned with us.”

Ulx falls beside her, pulling away his hand from his ice-sealed wound, “Then let’s make him.” His flying form suddenly buries itself in the ground, digging through until Lavinia can only feel him through the vibrations of his excavation.

She readies herself for whatever magic Ulx is about to unleash and prepares her own. It annoys her that blood can only answer her will when it’s been physically suffused with her Essence and the bastard fiend burnt his own men already.

Still, Lavinia has enough of a connection with the blood of her fallen and burnt foes that she can gather the drops, stains and remain puddles of their blood to form hardy Blood Blades on each of her vambraces.

The ground shudders, catching even the snobbish Promethus’ attention from the guttural chanting he’s been going at since escaping the lava pit. It seems Ulx has forsaken saving Corym as a structure in favour of saving its identity because the ground itself begins to stand up, carrying Lavinia on a giant rocky head.

“Caldri, Goblins, Escape.” Ulx’s voice cuts through all the noise and invades her mind and all others with that one order. At the sight of his rising golem many of the Caldri have already turned tail.

With giant rock arms, Ulx golem claps and a thunderous wave of mana infused wind cuts a curtain between the flames engulfing the walls of the city. That, more than anything they’ve done captures Promethus’ full attention and ire.

“No!” The Mage seethes and fuels the fires to grow and consume the gap, “I’m not done with you.”

Whatever he intends to do with the lives of the Caldri and goblin army is none of Lavinia’s concern, she sees an opportunity to strike and she takes it. Sprinting across the golems arms Lavinia quickly arrives at it’s rock stitch fingers, her boots and a generous bit of Essence and Blood Strengthening propel her further than she’s ever leapt.

The wind billows through her hair as she soars and if she weren’t moving to decapitate a human she’d be elated at the near flight sensation. She swings at his throat, slicing through them with shocking but pleasing ease. She begins falling right after but refuses, grabbing his legs instead she climbs atop the flaming man, her legs, face and hair burn but her torso is well protected by her cloak.

Promethus’ flames at die at the walls, allowing the army to escape just as Lavinia dares to sink her fangs into the man’s neck. He’s startled out of flight and begins to lose control. With his extra arms he smacks and blows punches into Lavinia’s exposed sides but she drinks his confused blood all the same, refusing to let go until they crash.

When they do Lavinia immediately rolls over, burning through Essence to give her the strength to do so with her many burns. With her and the army out of the way Ulx directs his golem to begin pummelling the bastard human into the ground, his fire flares up in resistance and the clenched knuckles of the golem soon drip lava.

With the short reprieve Lavinia digs into her burnt pocket, hoping she hasn’t lost all the Soul Crystals to her callous attack. She finds two out of the many she reaped and is grateful, she crushes and absorbs the Essence of two Crimson tiers, buckling as a wave of lethargy washes over her. She shakes her vision clear and narrows at the hole in Corym Ulx’s mana and Essence rock is making.

Her eyes widen as [Inspect] reveals a trap all too late. Ulx punches again but one of his fists splits open as Promethus’ cunningly burrows through it, manipulating the lava to protect him as he digs through to smite Ulx at the centre.

“Wave Shot!” Rather than see Promethus successful, Lavinia sends her exploding ball at Ulx shoulder, the explosion slices into it and gives Ulx a chance to transmute his rock to obsidian, blocking Promethus from journeying any further within the appendage.

Lavinia falls to a knee, out of breath and dizzy with Essence. But the work isn’t done, no, far from it.

“Ulx!” A demon bellows from the flames engulfing Corym’s walls. Lavinia squints as a large, rotund demon of fire simply strolls in through the inferno like it isn’t even there.

[Vatreni]

The Vatreni radiated more Essence than she’s ever seen in a single demon, he wears a visage of pride and amusement even as a thick whip of vines and roots descends upon him. He shields himself with a flaming arm, the flames intensified to burn through the attack as it falls over his head.

“You have too many friends I see.” The demon continues, strolling in unheeded as Ulx struggles against Promethus’ growing fire.

What is it with fire today? Lavinia picks herself up and glares at the Vatreni, he doesn’t mind her at first but does a quick double take followed by the same look Promethus gave her.

She growls.

“Lavinia, this just got a whole lot worse.” Ulx echoes in her mind.

A scratch of static comes from her finger and from it she hears Jonn, “Lavinia, I hope you’re having a better time than I am…I think…I think I might…I might need to keep fighting. I’ll keep fighting until you’re back.”

The abrupt message sends a jolt through Lavinia. She might not have known him long but the sound of fear and hesitation in Jonn’s voice was hard to miss. Her ally was in danger.

Her neck snapped away from the Vatreni to where Ulx smashed his half-obsidian golem arm into a stake of ice, trying to get the fiendish Promethus out. “Ulx, leave Promethus to me.”

“Good, I was about to suggest that.” Ulx’s golem manifests an ice sword and slices off the arm Promethus is trapped in, letting it fall before quickly thundering over Lavinia to slice at the Vatreni plagued by whips and vines from the forest and swamp.

Lavinia squares up, ignoring how most of her skin is crisp and how her legs trembled from exhaustion. Promethus cracks out of the golem’s chopped hand, looking annoyed as he lifts lava away from his eyes.

“I asked you a question, Promethus.” Lavinia says, standing before the fiend of a human, “Where is my GroveStaff?”

He cocked his head to the side, amused as he stepped off Ulx’s golem arm, “That staff was yours? Hmm, well, that’s unfortunate for you because it’s a major ingredient in my-”

[{Blood Rush} Active!]

Lavinia’s fist connects with his jaw faster than he can react, snapping it free of its hinges. She leans, twists and buries her feet in his chest, smacking him back against the obsidian golem arm, his head knocking back into it with a crack.

“I don’t care if you’re human, I am going to eat you.”