If I hadn’t experienced the brink of death, I might never have been able to harness the feeling. If I weren’t the Pioneer of Sorcery, I might lack the control over mana to force it beyond its meager vessel.
Three of those crackling bolts miss their marks as the Hunters’ commander shifts and turns her body, letting them fly between her arms and legs. One dies even before then, damned by her aura-blanketed blade. Soundlessly, one rips through the flesh of her right shoulder - a fraction of a second later, another breaches her chest. I think I may hear the growl of a wild beast rolling out from the lowest parts of her throat, spurred on by the piercing of one of her lungs.
She is an ancient ember, an ephemeral flame which has survived even a confrontation with the old Sorcery. The wall between me and Adeline. Most would have created distance, to reassess the situation and perhaps even flee. Instead, she pivots toward me, a hound hunting its mark. It isn’t impatience, it’s an acknowledgement: in order for her to survive, I must die.
My mana, which coated the air around us, now rebounds back. All at once, that energy compresses and condenses into my body - returned to its rightful place. The muscles of my body don’t strain or tense, I force them to relax, to accept that vast influx. I’m left feeling lightheaded, but nothing worse.
A brief flick of her wrist causes that burning blade to sear through the air toward me, driven by nothing more than instinct and reflex. A week ago, my head would have been severed from my shoulders without me being able to do so much as twitch a muscle in response to that comet-like sword. But I’m faster now - and the Commander, for her part, has been affected by her injuries.
In another flash, the energy in the air twists and distorts. An invisible thread - a link that had been placed mere minutes ago - strains and stretches and tugs at me. Less than a blink passes before I find myself there, warped away from my foe. Five meters, a gap she could close in an instant if she wished. Instead, and much to my surprise, she merely turns to me.
As if to make clear that she hadn’t noticed who I am before, I see a glint of recognition wash into her eyes. They widen, their owner trying to absorb every bit of me into her gaze.
“You…” She wheezes, a look of discontent upon her face, “Your heart, I… How are you alive?”
“Got lucky,” I respond, “that’s all.”
“Lucky…” She says, and then laughs grimly. It devolves into wet coughing before long, and then that laughter comes to a halt with a sigh. After her free hand brushes off blood from below her lip, she finally agrees, “Yeah, you must have...” Then, with a deep breath, she hefts that blade of hers - its flames dimmed for the moment - over her shoulder with a degree of effort that would only befit some great hammer or mace.
“I always worried about her coming back from the dead.” She says, “Woman like her couldn’t just go to the grave - no, even Death’s wicked blade might just get shattered by her magic. You did what she couldn’t. But, you know… A mortal’s touch comes easier than Death’s.” She huffs, and then stomps the floor.
A crashing, cracking sound of splintering wood resounds through the hall, and a moment later flaming fragments of what was once the floor hurtle toward me. In that same instant, my mana - the energy of my soul - fills the space around me. Stars fill my vision, but I refuse to relent. My fists clench tightly, and the air is suffused with it, Integration grants me control over it, if only for a brief time.
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I drive out a palm, and the wood is scattered into the winds with an accompanying sound that roars like thunder. The recoil of it is enough to shunt my mana from the air, and to temporarily diminish my soul’s intrusion outside of my body.
Her aura, which has grown closer startlingly quick, disrupts that pocket of mana. Even when she’s entrenched in it, her own energy seems to be a barrier against my own. More than that, even - it feels as if that searing aura of hers is enough to sizzle away what pieces of mana that it touches. Slowly, but consistently. If I continue to hold out my energy to the flame, I’ll lose it all eventually.
Josephine winds up for an attack, though it feels inaccurate to imply that this took longer than an instant. I feel the thread of connection between me and the place behind her - the place I designated after warping before. This is the power of Bogadh, the second ring that Cairbre gave me. With a bit of focus, and intent, I…
Her blade bears down on that barely-noticeable thread of energy, severing it before the edge of her sword even meets it. In the next step, it flies forward, carving a path through the air toward my chest. Every micro-movement and adjustment is guided by her expert hand.
Coiníncos sparks to life, and I press lightly against the ground. It seems to respond to my intent, applying just the right amount of force. My feet send me into the air just before her sword would’ve struck my heart once more. The hall’s ceiling is short, and so I’m quite thankful to have not just smashed flat into it. I whirl around in the air, just in time to see Josephine pull back her sword for a stab more brutal than any I’ve yet seen from her.
Rather than fall on her sword and be impaled, I condense a segment of my mana, leaving a scrap of it behind for Bogadh while even more gather and coalesce to form a steady, concentrated stream of energy. Heart pounding in my chest, I suffuse a bead of air with heat. Raw, undisturbed heat. I offer a silent prayer to any force of the world that will listen. Please, only ignite this mana.
That shimmering pearl catches a spark, and an explosion of heat and fire consumes my sight and the room as a whole.
My mana withdraws, and my body descends into a feverish spiral. It feels as if my skin is being held beneath a bubbling, boiling pot of water - but I am being protected from harm nonetheless. Above me, wood cracks and crashes, the ceiling forcibly burst open and removed by the force generated. That same force flings me backward as I continue to fall. My senses don’t reach far enough to tell whether or not the damage has extended past the second floor.
Beneath, Josephine has already leapt back, far away from the flame - and me.
The straining of my ankles and the pressure on my feet tell me that I’ve finally found purchase on solid ground once more. My vision is still flooded with smoke, enough to make my eyes water - and so I close them instead. All around me, even more sounds of rubble being made continue to fill the air. The walls, already on the verge of crumbling, catch like tinder.
This palace will burn. With the clash happening within its halls, and the fire that rages now, it will surely be turned to ash and soot before anyone can stop the flame’s procession.
Beyond the intense heat and smoke saturating my lungs, though, there is something else. What am I truly capable of, when everything has been laid out and the desire to avoid death is cast aside? The force of my own spell very nearly sent me crashing through the ceiling of the building - very nearly incinerated me.
I push the feeling down. The spell wasn’t powerful enough to stop her, so why should I be concerned? She still lives, and so I must keep fighting.
I must.