--- Atrog ---

Atrog did not hesitate for a second. Sophus had just barely passed the barrier, and immediately had to dodge a sword coming for his face.

It was important not to give enemy spellcasters time to plan or to cast their spells.

To Atrog's surprise and disappointment, Sophus did not attempt to cast a shield spell, and instead blocked the sword with his rod. Defensive shield spells were a standard tactic of mages, and usually very effective. In this case however, it could have meant the wizard's death: Atrog's sword came from the feywild and carried a number of enchantments on it. One of those would have allowed him to bypass this standard defense.

He had never used that ability before, as the opportunity had never come up, so he did not understand how Sophus could possibly have known about it. In fact, he had promised Rania never to talk to anyone about the prophecy at all. She claimed that would make it work better. However, the prophecy mostly talked about a number of things that clearly had nothing to do with their current predicament.

A very unfortunate fact. As much as he disliked the randomness and unpredictable nature of the fey, Tonos, and narrative logic in general, now would be a good time for them to help. He preferred relying on skill and preparation, and on the support of the gods he prayed to. But the enemies they had encountered here had pushed them all to their limits, and their strange ritual even got many of Atrog's gods to abandon him. Beggars can't be choosers, and right now he would not have minded at all if the strange prophecy that came with his sword had been at all relevant to the situation.

Atrog's thrust carried a lot of force with it, and when the kobold blocked the sword with his rod, the impact threw Sophus back against the wall of force.

He did not act surprised by this, nor was he disoriented. Instead, he started casting a spell with one hand, even as he expertly parried Atrog's follow-up strikes with the rod in his other hand. Atrog's attacks were superhumanly fast due to his empowerment by the Law of Adversity, while Sophus moved at normal speeds. And yet, the teacher seemed to have no difficulty predicting each of his attacks. He was slow, but his movements were precise and minimal, and carried just enough force to divert his strikes.

He felt like he was fighting a martial artist instead of a wizard.

And where was his support? Why wasn't the enemy getting pelted by arrows and spells?

He briefly looked through Rania's eyes through their shared telepathic bond, and realized in shock that Sophus had expertly positioned himself. Atrog was blocking her line of fire and the layout of the room prevented her from getting a clean shot. Every time she moved into a better position, Sophus moved aside just enough to keep Atrog between the two of them.

This was clearly far beyond the skill a wizard should have. But the man had cast a spell on himself earlier and claimed that the Living City would be guiding his hands. If that wasn't a lie, Atrog was currently fighting an entity so intelligent, it bordered on the precognitive. Or if the rumors were true, it might actually be able to see the future in truth.

Atrog had his strength and no small amount of skill, while Sophus was weak, but skilled beyond measure.

He decided to disengage briefly and take a step back, to give Rania and the others a clean shot. Skill could only carry someone so far, against overwhelming firepower.

But the moment he gave Sophus time to breath, the kobold uttered a brief incantation and disappeared in a flash, as he teleported away. Only a moment later, Rania's arrow and one of Aranea's lasers cut through the space he just occupied.

Normally they would be relying on Balron and Galanys to counterspell any teleports. Unfortunately Balron was unable to speak, and therefore unable to cast most of his spells. A brief look through Galanys' eyes showed him that Rania had passed in front of her, blocking her vision, at the precise moment she would have needed line of sight to start casting her counterspell. That timing had been utterly absurd.

A powerful voice suddenly boomed through the room: "Through the Power of Friendship, we will prevail!"

Aranea was floating in mid air, in the middle of the room. She had started her civilshape transformation sequence. Back when she had first explained the concept of civilshaping to him, everyone had expected that she would just learn to turn into a regular humanoid with a very brief magical transformation. Even her teacher Tanya had been surprised when it turned out that civilshaping instead required an elaborate transformation sequence, but also ended up empowering her for the short duration it lasted. Rania had squeed excitedly for over an hour when she found out, and insisted that this was something called a Magical Girl Transformation.

Aranea was glowing brightly and her limbs were spastically moving all over the place. Rania had informed him that this was deliberate, and it was supposed to be a dance. It was far from the only weird part of that transformation. He still hadn't managed to figure out where the boomingly loud catchphrase was coming from, since Aranea couldn't actually talk. For that matter, the origin of the sudden wind, butterflies and rose petals, as well as the orchestra music accompanying the transformation were equally mysterious to him. He was pretty sure that she was snacking on some of the summoned butterflies when she thought nobody was looking, too.

She even ended up wearing an outfit after her transformation. That part at least made some sense to him. A druid who entered his wildshape would lose his clothes, but they would reappear when he turned back into a humanoid. So it made some sense to him that Aranea would generate clothes from thin air when she civilshaped. Still, he had no idea why the clothes had to look so incredibly garish. Rania and Aranea both seemed to love it though, so it wasn't his place to complain.

Unfortunately, as powerful as Aranea was when she was civilshaped, the transformation would take several more seconds to complete. A lot could happen in that time.

And so Atrog banished all thoughts of the giant psychic shapeshifting spider from his head. She would be ready when she was ready. He focused on looking around to see where Sophus' teleport had taken him, instead.

In a flash of light, the kobold reappeared right next to Balron. The dwarf had been prepared to fight without his own magic, by using wands, and he had already drawn the first of those from his veritable arsenal of magic weapons. Unfortunately, he had not been prepared to fight in melee range and when he tried to fire his wand at Sophus, the kobold simply knocked it aside with his rod. The rod glowed as it channeled a spell, and he struck at Balron. The attack was deflected by an invisible barrier, but several of the magical runes covering Balron's armor lit up and exploded.

There were far too many specialized wards on his friend's armor for Atrog to have any idea what just happened, but the feeling of panic that emanated from Balron told him all he needed to know: Whatever that spell was, it had done a number on his defenses.

Atrog was still meters away and wouldn't be able to intercept Sophus' next strike in time, so he called upon his divine power and burned a good chunk of it for a burst of speed. He flew across the room and struck Sophus, just before the man could land a killing blow on his friend. Unfortunately, the kobold shifted his rod at the last moment and jumped into the air. Atrog hit the rod head on, with the full force of his divinely empowered charge.

A normal person would have been instantly pulped by the sheer force of the impact, but the strange rod absorbed Atrog's blow with a glow of magic, and Sophus went flying across the room without being hurt, in complete defiance of the laws of inertia.

No, not just across the room, Atrog noticed in dismay. His strike had launched Sophus on a direct path towards Aranea, who was floating defenselessly in the air.

That couldn't have been a coincidence, Atrog thought, and yet the timing and precision involved boggled his mind.

Sophus' rod once again flared with a glow of magic as he struck Aranea in the abdomen in mid flight. The magically empowered strike launched the spider clean across the room, where she crashed against a wall. They all felt her telepathically cry out in pain. She was badly hurt. Still alive, but only barely.

She stopped glowing. The wind, butterflies and rose petals dissipated, and the orchestra stopped playing.

"Hey, no fair!" Rania shouted. "You aren't even letting us show off our cool moves!"

"Of course not. That would be stupid." Sophus responded.

Then he disappeared in a second flash of teleportation and reappeared next to Galanys.

Fortunately, Dov had seen this coming and was ready to intercept him.

Galanys frantically tried to escape. Balron and Aranea were still lying on the ground and reeling from the assault.

"*Galanys, focus on countering his teleports! We need a way to lock him down!*" He told Galanys as he ran to join Dov in melee. There were six of them and only one of him, but he was picking them off one by one while avoiding their attacks. If they could reduce his maneuverability somehow, they could easily regain the upper hand.

"That's super rude!" Rania shouted at Sophus. "Aranea has put a lot of work into her awesome transformation sequence!"

While everyone else was fighting, Rania was talking. He had learned by now that, against all logic, this actually made tactical sense. As Lilian put it, talking was a free action for them so long as they had the support of Tonos. Or of the spirits, as Rania insisted instead.

The problem was that right now they had neither.

And so Rania did not seem to notice that time was passing normally and Sophus was attacking them even as she wasted her time talking instead of shooting her arrows.

"That transformation looked ridiculous and it wasn't lore accurate for a magical girl at all." Sophus responded, while he attacked with his rod and cast a spell with his free hand.

"*Wait, how did he do that?*" Atrog thought as he barely dodged a bolt of lightning from Sophus. "*How can he cast spells while talking?*"

"*The voice is coming from an item he is carrying.*" Balron responded. "*I think the Living City is multitasking for him.*"

His friend had to be right, it was the only explanation for what Atrog was seeing. This single wizard was fighting them on three fronts at the same time: He was casting spells, he was hitting them in melee, and he was debilitating Rania with psychological warfare, of all things.

He was exploiting Rania's belief in stories to keep her occupied while he fought the rest of them.

And it seemed to be working perfectly, too. Rania was extremely upset about Sophus' insult, and had started going into a rant on Aranea's lore accuracy, whatever that was. The spider sent enthusiastic waves of appreciation through her mental link as Rania apparently defended her honor.

That was when it really sank in for Atrog: They were not fighting a wizard here. Sophus was just a vessel for the Living City. They were fighting a superhumanoidly intelligent entity, and it was toying with them. This was what it must have felt like for Cilia Ulein to fight them, back when they had the backing of Tonos.

"*Focus, Rania!*" He mentally screamed at her. "*Shoot him!*"

He felt intense confusion from Rania as she finally snapped out of it and started shooting again. Her Arrows were as accurate as ever, but Sophus seemed to have no trouble parrying them with his rod, or blocking them with shield spells.

Unfortunately she continued talking even now, and Atrog couldn't help but feel that she would be fighting far more effectively if she wasn't trying to have a conversation at the same time. She still hadn't realized that story logic did not apply anymore. Only their training and preparation mattered now.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"It would be more glorious if you could beat us despite our powerups." She said. "So you should totally let Aranea try again."

"Yes, it would be slightly more glorious." Sophus agreed without opening his mouth, as the Living City responded for him. "But it would not be worth the trouble. Once the Myr are done with their ritual, everything else that happened here will be merely a footnote anyway.

"The only reason I want you here is to kill you properly." It added maliciously.

Was it really the Living City itself that was talking to them right now? It sounded so spiteful. He had not expected that an entity like that could even experience such an emotion. But he supposed that if anything could manage to anger the Living City, defying all vampire tropes, openly rejecting its influence, and sparkling in the sunlight to add insult to injury would probably do it.

"That doesn't sound right." Rania responded. "We have way too much ontological inertia from all the adventures we have been on to become a footnote. Honestly, I think the Myr are pretty disappointing and I don't believe you when you say their summoning matters. They aren't even fighting us right now."

Then after a few seconds she added "But I guess at least their ominous chanting provides some cool background ambiance. Almost makes me feel like I'm watching an opera."

"...I hate you so unbelievably much." The Living City responded.

Galanys started casting a larger spell, while Atrog and Dov attacked Sophus together. They surrounded him and synchronized their attacks, as they had practiced many times before.

The tiny wizard dodged them both, swirled his robe in the same motion, and threw it in Atrog's face. Dov shared her vision with him, so at least he was not blinded, but it still took him precious seconds to disentangle himself. In that time, Sophus frustratingly did not attack him, despite his seeming helplessness, and he kept his distance instead. The Living City must have known that Atrog wasn't blinded, and still posed a threat.

As Galanys continued casting her spell, an assortment of glowing orbs started floating around her.

Dov hit Sophus with a flurry of blows strong enough to break stone, but he simply cast another shield. He wasn't getting hurt, but at least they were draining him of mana. He would not be able to keep up his defensive spells forever.

Rania shot at the teacher, and instead of using a spell to block the arrow, he used his rod to deflect it towards Atrog.

Still blinded and only able to see through Dov's eyes, he only barely managed to dodge, and the arrow itself seemed to do most of the dodging: The Arrows of Bad Guy Slaying actively avoided hitting Rania's friends or other people their fey creators classified as Good Guys.

"*Now!*" Galanys shouted in their minds as she finished her spell, and with a quick incantation she sent a dozen glowing orbs flying towards Sophus. Each of them looked different, none of them was flying in a straight line, and they all took a different path to hit Sophus from every direction at once.

Dov jumped backwards to avoid the barrage, and they all watched as the spells descended on their enemy.

The old kobold closed his eyes, jumped into the air, and contorted his limbs in ways that hurt just to look at. Then he did a pirouette and swiped his rod through the air, hitting three of the orbs in the process and launching them back towards Galanys. Somehow, all of the other orbs missed him as well and collided with each other.

Galanys managed to block two of the projectiles he deflected back at her, but the third one hit her. Atrog felt a flash of pain from her as she burst into flames. He was shocked by the display, but also relieved because that could have gone much worse. Galanys was only on fire, and he had drilled them all on what to do when you suddenly burst into flames in the middle of a fight. He had no doubt that this would only be a temporary inconvenience for her, so he focused his attention back on Sophus.

As the man finished his ridiculously agile acrobatic stunt, he landed back on the ground with a grunt, and a crack. That sounded like a bone breaking. Based on Atrog's extensive experience, the man had just fractured the Talus in his left foot.

It completely ruined the image of his stunt, and Atrog shared the confusion he felt from Rania at the sight of this. It did not look narratively appropriate, as she would put it. But then he realized he was being irrational. Sophus wasn't pulling off a dramatic movement because Tonos thought it would look cool. He was moving economically because the Living City was directing his movements through precognition. And that Old Power did not care if its puppet suffered, and it held no loyalty to narrative conventions, either.

If he broke his foot, it was only because the Living City did not predict that he would need his foot anymore in this fight. As he thought about it, the wizard's graceless landing made Atrog more nervous about their chances, not less.

Atrog and Dov both moved to get back into melee before Sophus could fully recover from his landing, but before they could reach their target, they both received a short mental ping from Balron, telling them to stand back. They both stopped immediately, and Atrog was happy to see the reason for the interruption:

Balron had a clear line of fire at Sophus with a strange wand, while the old teacher was still kneeling on the ground. He would not be able to dodge this.

"Parry this, you filthy casual!" Balron shouted maliciously, as he fired the strange wand.

It sounded like an emotional outburst, and it even served as a warning for Sophus. Both behaviors were uncharacteristic of the normally pragmatic dwarf. At first Atrog thought Balron was feeling offended by the fact that Sophus was a teacher, like himself, but not a professional adventurer, and therefore a "casual", as he put it. But then he noticed which wand Balron was firing, and it suddenly made more sense: The oddly shaped wand fired a thin beam of entropic energy.

This attack would bypass most physical objects and harm the first living entity it hit. The rod should not be able to deflect it, so Balron was goading Sophus into attempting to parry it, instead of dodging out of the way.

To his surprise, the kobold did not even attempt to dodge the deadly beam.

It hit him directly in the chest and ...suddenly a dead chicken fell to the ground?

What?

A dead chicken had materialized from a patch of clothing on Sophus' cloak.

"Surprise." The Living City declared laconically. "Spells that only affect creatures can be blocked by transfiguring animals into armor pieces. This was a successful test run for Ablative Animal Armor under live conditions. Congratulations, Sophus. Your invention will go into production after this."

"Thank you, master." The teacher responded.

"The production version will be the puppy-based variant. Ablative Puppy Armor has the additional benefit of causing psychological scarring on attackers with moral scruples."

This was wrong on so many levels, and Atrog wanted to object strenuously. But they were in the middle of a fight, and winning took priority. He did not make it as far as he did as a paladin if he was this easy to distract by moral outrage.

Ironically, the rest of his team had not trained themselves for this, and so all of them were just a little hesitant to attack. Rania actually opened and closed her mouth several times as if to respond, and lost precious seconds in which she could have been shooting her bow.

All of this gave Sophus an opening. As he fought off Atrog as before, he cast a spell with his free hand and nobody stopped him. By the time the others snapped out of their shock, it was already too late for them to interrupt the casting.

A massive whirlwind of ice and snow suddenly appeared in the room, centered around Balron. Galanys and Rania managed to escape before the storm could fully build up, but Balron was caught right at the center of the storm.

"*No! He broke my frost resistance amulet earlier!*" Balron transmitted in a panic.

Atrog shared Balron's pain through the telepathic link as the dwarf's temperature dropped rapidly. After a few seconds, Dov had to weaken the connection so that his pain would not distract the rest of them. He was lying prone in the middle of the storm, and it was clear he wouldn't be able to save himself. In Atrog's estimate, he would probably die in a few minutes if they did not manage to stop the storm and heal him in time.

Rania stood at the edge of the storm and was clearly psyching herself up to dive in and save their teammate.

With a heavy heart, Atrog told her to stop: "*Focus on the enemy, Rania! We can save Balron after we have won.*"

Cruel as it was, it was the only realistic way to win here. Balron was out of the fight already anyway, and if worse came to worst, some of the other teams had clerics with them that should be able to revive him if they hurried.

Rania steeled her resolve and rejoined the fight: "We can't die yet. Lots of us still have unresolved plotlines!"

Atrog sighed internally. Even now she thought like this. But if her delusion helped to get her focused on the fight, he wasn't going to complain about it.

"*I have an idea!*" Galanys suddenly said, and Atrog felt an excited glimmer of hope from her.

Then she ran to one of the machines scattered throughout the room and started casting a spell at it.

At Atrog's silent telepathic command, Dov went after Sophus to keep him occupied while he moved to protect Galanys as she did whatever she was doing. Without Galanys or Balron to counter the enemy's teleport, they would have no choice but to split their forces. If they left him alone, he would be free to cast spells, and if they both went after him, he would teleport past them and strike at Galanys while she was unprotected.

Dov was more mobile than he, while he had access to defensive spells, so sending her on the offensive was the smarter choice. It was entirely logical, but he still could not shake the terrible feeling that he was sending her to die while he took a breather himself.

After just a few seconds, far faster than he had expected, Galanys finished her spell. The machine in front of her started glowing, and several thin, glowing lines erupted from it. One of them reached out and attached itself to Galanys' forehead. A second one attached itself to Sophus.

Then a third reached behind Sophus, and passed through the wall of force as if it wasn't there. It split into several smaller tendrils, and each attached itself to one of the Myr.

Atrog was not an expert on these things, but it looked like Galanys was tethering their minds together, and connecting them to the strange machine. He had no idea what it did, but presumably Dov did. and she must have told Galanys about it. Whatever it was, he felt hopeful. They might just win this now.

"No." The Living City said, as Sophus touched his rod to the strand connected to his forehead. The spellwork collapsed immediately, and all of the strands dissipated into nothing.

Galanys shouted out in pain, then fell silent.

"*Galanys? Are you alright? What happened?*" Dov asked.

There was no response.

"I am an Old Power." The Living City said. "I have fought the legions of heaven to a standstill. Did you really believe that this woman could find a way to defeat me in a matter of seconds? Just like that? No. Everything you can do, I have already accounted for. You should not be surprised that I am winning. It is only logical, after all.

"What do you think this is, that you would have a chance? Do you think of yourselves as the heroes of a story? No, this is reality, and you will be just a footnote in history."

To her credit, Dov did not allow the possible death of her lover to slow her down or to distract her. She only grew fiercer with her attacks. Unfortunately, it was not enough. Before Atrog could rejoin her in her fight against Sophus, the kobold managed to hit an unprotected part of her arm. The rod flared with magic, and suddenly the telepathic connection was swamped with a plethora of thoughts and images. Far too many of them at once for Atrog to understand.

Atrog stumbled under the onslaught of images. Dov just stood there disoriented and in stunned silence. It gave Sophus enough time to cast a more powerful spell.

Dozens of ethereal blades flashed into existence around Dov and sliced at her from all directions at once.

She made a valiant effort to dodge, but it was not enough.

She cried out in shock, as she lost her left arm and both of her legs. She collapsed in a pool of her own blood, unable to move and in extreme pain.

"*Heh. It's only a flesh wound.*" She tried to joke. But she was not fooling anyone, and her feeling of despair flowed through the telepathic link clear as day.

Only Atrog and Rania remained.

Atrog reached Sophus in melee just a second too late to interrupt his spell and save Dov, but sometimes a single second was all that mattered.

He lost himself in the fight as he traded blows with the diminutive teacher, who by all rights should have been easy to kill. At this point, Atrog was out of ideas and running on pure instinct, hoping to get just one good, solid hit in.

But it was not to be, and Sophus managed to land a hit on Atrog instead.

The rod flared with its magic again, and suddenly Atrog understood.

He understood everything.

He understood that he was very likely going to die here. He saw his life flash before his eyes, and had visions of his past deeds, both good and ill. There was too much ill there for his liking, but on the whole it was not bad at all. It was a life well lived. And he understood now too, on a deeper level than just hope or wishful thinking, that if the afterlife was at all how the priests described it, then he was sure to make the transition into an angel with his faculties intact.

And as he understood and comprehended all of these things, he also realized what just happened to Dov, and he understood that he really should not have let his thoughts wander in the middle of combat.

Sophus formed a spike of ice with his free hand, and shot it into his stomach.

As the pain took him, he also understood exactly what Sophus' rod did: It was an Artifact, called the Rod of Enlightenment. It had originally been designed as a teacher's implement, and its touch brought one closer to understanding one's role in the universe. On monks, it conferred enlightenment. On normal people, it usually just caused depression.

As he lay bleeding on the ground, he felt a small stab of pride at the thought that the Rod of Enlightenment had essentially proven his world view correct. But this was a small consolation to him, as he watched helplessly while Sophus went after Rania.

The normally chipper elf now had an unreadable expression on her face. Her emotions were everywhere between anger, fear, panic, and sheer disbelief at what was happening around her.

Sophus effortlessly dodged her arrows as he held up the Rod of Enlightenment and channeled additional mana into it. Far more than was necessary.

Then, without any fanfare whatsoever, he teleported behind Rania and struck her in the ribs. Not a killing blow, Atrog noted in confusion. He could have easily gone for the head instead.

The Rod of Enlightenment flared up brighter than before, and Rania's eyes rolled back. Then she dropped to the ground, unconscious.

The fight was over.

They had lost.

"Finally." Sophus said as he looked down at Rania's crumpled form.

Then, seemingly without a care in the world, he walked back over to Atrog, and raised his weapon to execute him.

Atrog uttered a brief prayer, knowing that there would be no answer. Not with the ritual still going on and blocking his connection to the gods.

He wondered if he would meet his friends again in heaven, and if all of them would still be the same.

Then the rod came down.

--- Rania ---

"Ow. What happened?" Rania wondered as she took a look around.

Her vision was odd. She had a difficult time even putting it into words. As best as she could tell, she was seeing everything, everywhere, all at once? And it really made her head hurt.

That was odd. Sophus had not even hit her in the head. So why was it hurting so much? Her memories were really jumbled right now.

One thing she knew for sure though was that she was very dissatisfied with the overall situation.

"You died." Somebody responded helpfully.

She recognized the voice. Which was odd, because she had never, strictly speaking, heard the voice before. It was the spirit of the Library of Akash. She could see and hear it much more clearly now. She could see many other spirits, too.

"Yes, you died." A much more ominous, much more familiar voice added.

The Living City was here.

"I brought you here to stand in judgment, and I made sure that your mind was freed, so that you will understand the full weight of what you have done before we execute you properly."