The deafening scream of the war horn echoed across the slopes of the Serpent’s Maw, a cry to arms and violence. Even the horn itself sounded subtly wrong, the notes felt primal and jagged to my ears. Imperfect horn? Poor Orcish craftsmanship? It didn’t matter, because within the orc fortifications all of the thick skinned, heavily muscled humanoids hefted weapons and streamed out of the gates on the war path. If we hadn’t already been on their radar due to a scout, shaman, or whatever got us discovered, the chance of dealing with a disorganized enemy would have been an advantage.

They knew where we were, though, and the disorganized exit from their stronghold took on a new angle in my mind, when I realized they were avoiding clumping up.

“I summon the power of the Four Dragon Kings, ancient masters of earth, air, fire, and water, unleash your Elemental Dominion upon all who oppose me!” Lilith spoke quietly, but her voice cut over the horns of the orcs. Four pillars of different colors appeared to dot the slopes of the Serpent’s Maw, then lines of magic linked all four into a box. Blazing rocks fell from the sky, exploding into gouts of searing debris when they crashed onto the slopes of the Maw. A twister dipped down from the clouds, sending almost a dozen orcs into the sky and to their deaths.

Silence reigned for a second, before the final effect of the invocation kicked in. Bolts of ice fell across the stronghold, causing indiscriminate and heavy damage.

Lilith dropped to the ground, and Aisha caught her.

“You panicked,” I said softly. “We’ll clean the survivors up.”

I didn’t chastise my sister, even though her eyes said she expected it. She’d burned up all of her mana in one spell, and wasted all of the spell echoes she’d been holding onto for a boss fight or an emergency. Something about the orcs scared her into pulling out one of her largest spells in a panic. This was one of the most Un-Lilith like actions I’d ever seen her perform.

“Morgan, Akari, hold the line here and finish off any stragglers,” I went into the burning ruins of the stronghold myself. Not a single one of the orcs made it out of the cataclysmic spell unscathed, but plenty of them had been left alive. I finished them off with the most precise blows I could manage. For all of my dashing around like an idiot, Morgan struck more finishing blows than I did. Morgan created thin tendrils of darkness that hardened into blades that attacked the injured orcs before they could muster any defenses. Maybe I should’ve just left it to Morgan, their ranged efficiency outstripped mine by ridiculous margins.

Ten minutes later, we sat looking at one of the Eyes of Fire, and the notification we had to retrieve one more, still.

“Sorry, everyone. Something in that horn made me freak out and cast the most damaging spell I could, with all my power behind it.”

“Fear,” Morgan said.

“Yeah, I freaked out. I was terrified,” Lilith agreed.

“No, hon. Morgan means you were affected by fear, the status ailment. Or Terror, or something very similar to it. I didn’t have any of my resilience buffs up on the party.” Aisha immediately took blame for Lilith’s succumbing to a debuff personally. I wondered why I had been immune to it, pure luck?

“Look, we won, no one got hurt, no big deal. How long do you need to be combat ready again?” Tyler asked, pausing only momentarily before he spoke with sympathy. “I got hit with the fear too, we all did.”

Everyone nodded at Tyler’s dismissal of the situation or agreed that they too had been affected by the fear. Why hadn’t I? No one seemed to notice I hadn’t been affected, they were all too busy dwelling on their own failure to resist it to notice I wasn’t echoing in. Even Lilith, for once, missed that I was the odd one-out, she was so consumed with self-recrimination. Even when I gave her a big hug, she failed to notice anything off with me.

Even Lilith was fallible. My entire life I hadn’t believed otherwise, and part of the adversarial relationship I’d always had with her fell away with this world reshaping realization.

“I’ll be ready in another ten minutes. It would be best if I cast a few small spells to help protect our minds and rebuild some of my Echoes.”

“I’m summoning a small fire spirit. Now that we have one of the Eyes I should be able to have it bring us to the other one,” Cassius told the group with a touch of pride. His Primal abilities to commune with spirits had become a huge part of Cassius’ abilities after his class upgrade and resulted in a large change in how he worked with others. Maybe he’d just needed better friends all along, or maybe the spirits kept him on the path to not being an asshole, but either way, I felt thankful to the spirits for the radical change in Cassius as a person.

Lilith and Aisha spent time casting an assortment of protective buffs on us, Tyler talked to the stone, Morgan looted the bodies and threw them into the smoldering remains of the orc encampment.

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

“We’re ready,” Lilith said with a sigh of relief. “Cassius, take the lead with Akari, Alexander, watch our trail with Tyler, please. Let’s go.”

The temporary blow to Lilith’s ego didn’t seem to be holding her back. Once more, her voice was clear, crisp, and full of confidence. As much as I enjoyed the idea of Lilith being fallible or making mistakes, I felt more comfortable with the strong, self-assured Lilith leading us. I sure didn’t want to be the one playing leader, there was too much to keep track of with a party of seven people, unknown terrain, and enemies.

Cassius and Akari led us on a semi-winding path further down the slopes of the Serpent’s Maw. From the rear I couldn’t hear the conversations, but I could see the two whispering to each other regularly. They led us on a path that avoided aggressive animals, which I appreciated. As creepy as scorpions were, this was their home, not ours. We didn’t need to butcher everything we ran across. Mom, or Libby, created them all for a reason, right?

My mind wandered a little in boredom, imagining the crazy adventures our parents were up to in the higher realm. Imagining it was hard, because I didn’t know anything about it, but in my head Telos and Kallos were in some ancient place full of mystery, and they solved them as easily as those cube puzzles one of the transmigrators kept making.

“Whom, or whatever, has the Eye is in the cave. My little salamander is afraid to peer through the fires inside. Tyler?” The group stopped, and Cassius turned straight to the dwarf.

“Oh, sure thing. Let me talk to the stone!” Tyler chimed in happily. He crouched down on his stubby legs and whispered to the rocky slope. I couldn’t detect any kind of sounds, responses, or energies, but Tyler sure seemed to be having a one-sided conversation with the ground. It occurred to me Cassius could’ve talked to earth spirits himself, but he’d instead opted to let Tyler take the lead.

Did he just not want to summon a stone spirit, or was he that considerate of a team player now? Or maybe there was another angle I was missing all together? It felt strange, knowing I’d helped reshape someone’s life so significantly.

“It’s Cinderwraiths,” Tyler declared with a growl.

“What the heck are Cinderwraiths?” Akari demanded to know.

“Cinderwraiths are twisted abominations that feed on heat and fire to sustain their existence. When a creature dies from hypothermia, the lingering resentments and hate of the cold can birth them. They aren’t precisely a Spirit, but they aren’t what I’d call a ghost either.” Cassius chimed in.

“They’re demons. An echo born of hate, desperate to consume heat. They’ll consume our lifeforce as readily as they will flames.” Lilith’s encyclopedic knowledge of monsters came from her constant barrages of questions of all people she met, or so she claimed, but I suspected she had a skill or ability that helped her.

“I hate wraith like enemies,” Tyler grumbled. “My axe barely hurts them, even when I use abilities.”

“Would a weapon enchantment buff be worth it, or do you think we can get away with relying on magic?” Aisha asked Lilith.

“You’ve got Holy Light enchantments, right? Will that spell hamper your combat proficiency, Akari, Morgan?”

“No, I’m a Shinobi. Holy won’t cause me any problems, especially in a fight I’m not trying to be stealthy in. Let’s rock some enchantments and kill these things quickly. I want to get into the dungeon!” Akari clapped her hands together excitedly, and I could see why Tyler enjoyed spending time with her. Her optimism and verve were energizing.

“I don’t need the holy enchantment, there’s no wraith that Moral Dilemma can’t cut,” Morgan answered proudly. Lilith couldn’t very well argue with them since our parents had forged the chain sickles Morgan used.

“Do you know how many Cinderwraiths we’ll be facing? Go ahead and cast Holy Light on the weapons of everyone but Morgan please, Aisha.”

Aisha did as bid, and sacred light glowed in her hands then split into motes that imbued everyone’s weapons, except for Morgan’s sickles.

“I can’t get a count. They’re gathered around the Eye of Fire. It could be one really big one, or a few hundred small ones, or somewhere in between.” Tyler held his hands up in frustration, but found himself distracted as a mote of light touched his axe and made the weapon glow with sacred light.

“Between one and a hundred Cinderwraiths,” Lilith murmured in thought.

“We’ll open with Alexander and Morgan unleashing a combo-attack of cold and darkness, which Cassius will follow up with Tempestas Nivium. If you start the cast while Morgan and Alexander’s attacks fade, it should be done by the time Alexander and Morgan join Akari and Tyler in holding the line. Aisha and I will duo-cast something appropriate based on how many and how strong of Cinderwraith’s are left, at which point we’ll be stuck in a melee.”

“After I call on the ice spirits, I could summon spirits of life to fight off the draining effects of the Cinderwraiths, if you and Aisha are going to continue duo-casting?” Cassius suggested, trying to be more useful than the one spell.

“That’s a good idea,” Aisha answered immediately, before Lilith could shoot down the suggestion.

“We’ve got a plan, then. Let’s execute it without any mistakes,” Lilith stared at me when she said that. I felt very called out, for no reason at all.

Morgan tapped my shoulder, and when I turned to look at them, cool lips touched mine in a brief kiss.

“For good luck, so we don’t get Progenitor of Peril’d,” Morgan answered my confused look with a smirk.

“Even you?” I whined, and everyone laughed at me.

“If you are done sulking, Alexander, we’ve got demons to kill,” Lilith chided me, but she did it with a smile. Apparently, the only bonding activity Lilith and Morgan could enjoy together was making fun of me.

Colors swam around me and blue took control of my aura as I activated cold Kinesis. I touched the patch of bare skin on Morgan’s forearm with cold, and they shivered but didn’t squeal. I didn’t dare try it on Lilith, there would be retribution, and Morgan seemed practically immune to the cold. Their darkness was very cold, so it wasn’t that shocking.

I sighed and took the forward position to lead the party towards the cave.

Morgan rubbed at the spot I’d cooled off with a touch the moment they thought I wasn’t looking, and that put a small smile on my face.