Her skin was on fire.

Her mind was on fire.

Her life had already gone up in flames, so why shouldn’t everything else? That was how a dragon thought, and Guan Fa Lian was a dragon now, wasn’t she? A dragon didn’t wonder if their actions were the right course, they simply were. She could be like that, she thought as she blasted forth.

Finally, something had arrived. An excuse to roar. A target for her immolation.

They had chosen a good name, these fools. The ashes were all that would be left.

Power destroyed the barriers within Fa Lian’s core. The dark soul stone that had been so heavy before was now like a frightened mouse, invisible unless she looked for it within herself. Good, she thought. I don’t want that power anyway. The sick, rotten feeling of the mana from the soul stone was almost a forgotten memory.

Like her mother.

Now the roar came. She had been missing with the staff, and now was being pushed. The red skinned demon attacked again and again. “Enough!” Along with her shout, the lid of the volcano fell open. In this small hallway, the force of her heat was almost a physical thing. She saw the body in front of her react before the person could. Sweat fell from their pores, and evaporated just as quickly.

Her breath was turning to steam from her mouth, she could feel the inferno within just waiting to be unleashed.

That’s it. Take a step closer.

The dragon’s growl within her mind reached cacophonous level. The claustrophobia of the grey walls that had felt like her only sight in weeks were weighing down like boulders in her clothes. The stress of the two chases - her own to find Shen, and the Ashes pursuit of themselves - was enough to wear down the weak walls of Lian’s psyche. Now, like an animal with its back to a wall, she was all claws and fangs. Her sight seemed to turn into a straight line, all her focus straight ahead.

There were scavengers before her that needed reminding where they stood on the food chain.

With her assault, she had singled out Endun. Due to the confines of the hallways, there was no room for two to attack at once while also dodging the dragon bo’s swinging strikes. Shazaar and Grier had stepped back to allow the battle to commence, trusting their ally to deal with the snapping and thrashing girl before them.

Even their concession annoyed Lian. Was she not worth their attention? Following Shazaar’s line of sight, Lian knew without looking, would lead her straight to Ah Dan. She was distracted. She would have tried to kill anyone who told her that, but thoughts of Ah Dan slowed her movements all the same.

The knife bit into her shoulder, the heat of the blade so different to her own. It was cold. Only for a moment though because the pain quickly turned from a distant prospect to an instant explosion of agony. The knife had been jabbed swiftly, the metal sliced through bone and muscle alike, Lian’s right arm dropped to her side uselessly.

Not stopped by the attack, Lian was far more angry at her useless body for giving up than the pain could possibly debilitate her. She would throw away all of her limbs if it meant that the enemy in front of her fell first. Whether or not she could make it happen was the only question.

She pounced forward again, planting the dragon bo into the ground and vaulting on it. Both of her feet connected heavily with Endun’s face and chest, sending him soaring through the air. She landed heavily with no right arm to balance herself, and had no defence as Grier stepped forward, a dense coating of mana covering the mace he wielded.

His downswing was interrupted by a heavy, orange coloured fist. The scene came into more full view as Hyun Soon pushed Grier backwards while shouting. Battle raged. To Lian it felt as though she were floating above the labyrinth, able to see through the impenetrable rock and watch from the sky. Her body shivered but she was not inside it right now.

From outside of herself, Lian watched with faint interest and patient confusion. Somewhere in the back of her mind, a dragon screamed her name but she wasn’t really listening. The bubble of anger had popped, and she had nothing to show for it but a pain in her shoulder and a shivering through her body that she couldn’t stop.

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The fight was not for domination, like Lian had been attempting. Hyun Soon used his strength to stop the mace dead. The impact sent a clear jarring force straight through both Hyun Soon and the dwarf. With his other fist, his centre of gravity low from the previous block, Hyun Soon swung a heavy hook into Grier’s side. The dwarf skidded back holding what had to be broken ribs.

Hyun Soon for his part had one good arm left. The mace had shattered his heavy armour and followed through to shatter his wrist. Before the hungry brigands could capitalise, Xiaomei whipped her arm forward. With a whistle and then a snap Xiaomei’s gift from the Guan family vault flew through the air before stopping in the middle of their attackers. Shazaar managed to bring his shield up, but the other two took the full brunt of Xiaomei’s lightning, an arc of yellow energy stabbing out from the charged crystal.

It didn’t do much damage, none at all to Shazaar it seemed. The defining difference between both parties was readily apparent once Dan showed his true potential. With a single touch, the mood shifted in the combatants. Shazaar looked frightened as Hyun Soon’s arm lost its unnatural bend and he reformed the armour which had broken before returning to a defensive battle stance.

Fa Lian wanted to smirk despite herself. That’s right, she thought despite the hypocrisy, my allies are strong.

She couldn’t tell Ah Dan to leave her alone as he approached after helping Hyun. With worry in his eyes and the strange mana armour he amalgamated on his body, he reached out towards her. “Let me help you.” She wasn’t sure that Dan had actually said the words aloud, but she heard them all the same.

Fine. I was only being stubborn anyway. My hands hurt.

Fa Lian had a lot of things she suddenly wanted to say to Ah Dan, but her throat wasn’t cooperating. She felt the heat around her rise, unbidden. She wanted to apologise to Ah Dan, as she saw the mana armour around him start to feel the effects of her ignitory mana. The dull grey-brown covering over Ah Dan’s skin started to flake away in the heat. Lian began to worry, the now exposed skin was beginning to blister.

Just leave me alone. Don’t worry about me.

The heat intensified again, the air itself truly igniting now in a blaze that forced everyone away from Lian once more. She could see it clearly from her vantage point above her own body. Maybe this is how Ah Dan sees, she thought and then giggled to herself.

The Ashes and Lian’s group had separated. The blazing of her mana, the roaring rage of Ryong Aang, had pushed them back.

Darkness began to blot out what she saw. The world began to dim even as the flames got hotter and hotter. Lian had thought she would leave her enemies in ashes, but it seemed like that would be her fate as she started to drift away. As she truly lost consciousness, the last thing she saw was the blaze of heat.

And a pair of silver eyes.

—————————————

The inferno was all encompassing.

Dan, Hyun Soon and Xiaomei had been pushed back to one side, the three members of the Ashes fell back to the other. In the middle of the hall, blazing like a sun, Guan Fa Lian was unconscious. The fire burning now was beyond her control. It had been gaining kindling in the form of frustration for days and now had gone far past boiling point.

Dan’s mana was being incinerated by the heat, so he could no longer make out the Ashes through the heat haze. He didn’t care about them any more. Just leave, Dan begged silently as he tried to get closer to the burning girl. Their fight could wait. Dan would give them whatever they wanted as long as Fa Lian survived this.

Like a physical force, the heat continued to push them stumbling back. “What’s happening?” Hyun asked, confused and worried. “What do we do?”

“It must be the staff,” Dan said quickly, “we have to get it away from her.”

“We can’t get close to her.”

“I can.” Dan was certain of it. He’d spent years sleeping with a forge on the other side of the wall. Despite the situation, Dan smiled. Park Man-Shik really was the best teacher you could have hoped for. There was no time to overthink or over plan.

Move. He ordered himself into action. One foot in front of the other. Push through. There was a wall in front of him. Dan churned mana, grabbing another fistful from Hyun Soon before pushing forward. Just throw everything you can do at once together. Simple.

Using his old master’s most basic mantra, Dan did everything he could. He piled layers of Hyun Soon’s technique on top of each other, as many as he could. Unlike Hyun himself, Dan’s version of the ability covered his whole body. He stepped forward and the top layer blew away, the furnace-like heat pushing forth pyroclastic bursts of mana which sheared away at his armour.

Stopping wasn’t an option, so he shoved himself forward yet again. Each step was like being torched by the heat of a volcano. Dan wasn’t even sweating any more, all the moisture stolen. His eyes were shut but that was fine, he could see in other ways. As Dan pushed through the conflagration before him, the flame a deep crimson and flecked with black, he in turn expelled all the mana he could manage just to see what was around him.

Unintentionally, Dan had done exactly the right thing. By forming layers of mana around himself, dense as armour, he had trapped air and insulated himself. By pushing against the heat with his own mana for vision, Dan had added another buffer. Despite that, the damage outweighed his protection. He could feel his skin sear as he got closer and closer to Fa Lian.

Thoughts of the enemy were all lost to incineration, cinders blown away by the breath of the dragon. He could see her now. Her left hand still gripped the dragon bo, but the hand was all bone now, the muscle and skin melted away. Dan’s tears at the sight his mana allowed him evaporated before they even formed.

It will be okay. Dan couldn’t open his mouth, couldn’t even breathe for fear of destroying his insides. He reached Fa Lian, his own skin now peeling away, his outstretched hand losing the glove of surrounding mana. The exposed skin flaked, the blood underneath boiled. A quiet part of Dan’s mind screamed that he was dying, but he couldn’t hear it over the buffets of mana-heated wind.

The beat against Dan again and again. Rhythmic. The wing beats of a phoenix.

Dan could see the shape of it before him as their mana began to mingle. Flowing from Lian’s core and backwards was the image of the fire within, the feeling of the mana itself. Dan could feel Fa Lian’s soul stone trembling at the centre of her core. He poured as much healing energy as he could into Fa Lian, not knowing how much would be enough. It was not the careful healing he had once performed to save Xiaomei, but a deluge of mana to douse the flames.

Finally, after agony, Dan sucked in a breath. He boiled, and lost himself to unconsciousness, certain he would not wake again.