The second the chains faded from sight, three things happened at once.

First, Glaustro surged forward and grabbed the golem’s core, whisking it into his dimensional pouch. Runes flickered into existence around him as he gathered mana, his normally red skin chalky-white with fear.

Second, a massive tremor raced through the ground under our feet, shaking the very world itself like it was trying to dislodge the entire upper crust of the planet.

Third, we saw several bursts of light shoot into the air in the far distance. My eyes widened, and my heart started beating faster. Each and every one of those points of light was a group of jinn, all headed our way.

We had just ambushed ten jinn with laughable ease, sure. But did that mean we were free to act with impunity? Nope. Even with the eternal sandstorm stripped away from this area, the jinn were more than capable of utilizing Lagyel’s sand against us. We were in a desert, after all.

Besides, we had no idea what kind of construct they might be able to conjure. A single ‘lesser’ golem alone would be tricky to handle, to say nothing of the jinn backing it up.

In other words, destroying both the golem core and a portion of jinn authority over Lagyel may well have sealed our speedy return to the Abyss.

Much to my relief, Glaustro seemed to be on top of things, as usual.

“To me! All of you! To me! I am opening a portal right now. Whoever fails to pass through the moment it’s open is going to be left behind!” the commander barked, making it clear that he would not accept any pointless shows of heroism or greed.

The demons seemed inclined to listen. They clustered around our group in record time, glancing repeatedly at the approaching jinn. Then Glaustro crushed another black marble, and the portal ripped itself open just as I started to feel a tide of the jinn’s mana brush against the lip of the crater from a distance.

I didn’t have time to wonder or panic at that. Glaustro’s hand closed around my upper arm, and I was dragged unceremoniously through the portal and back to the welcoming environment of the demonic capital on Lagyel.

A startled meow drew my eyes to Mia, whose eyes were huge and slightly clouded by the effects of Glaustro’s extreme speed. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one he chose to grab. Even in the chaos of the moment, I found myself feeling oddly glad about that.

Then any sort of reflection became impossible, because a veritable tide of demons came gushing out of the portal behind us.

The next few minutes were total chaos. We had arrived in a small plaza in the city, so space was limited. The first wave to come through couldn’t get out of the way fast enough. Within seconds, we were packed in like sardines.

For all his threats about leaving people behind, Glaustro immediately let go of me and Mia to make sure all his people got through. I couldn’t see over the heads of the crowd and into the portal, especially with so many horns in the way. But by the time the last demons stumbled through and Glaustro cut his hand through the portal’s edge, making it vanish, I vaguely glimpsed flashes of light and heard the sound of an explosion in the background.

“Are we missing someone?” Glaustro demanded loudly, eyes roving ceaselessly over the soldiers in his care. You couldn’t spot any anxiety on his face, but it was apparent in the tension of his shoulders and the extra intense glare he was sporting.

“It should be fine,” Bronwynn reassured him, though he himself was still trying to see over the heads of the gathered demons and do a count. “I’m pretty sure everyone made it through. The jinn didn’t respond that quickly. Probing shots were just starting out when the last groups used the portal.”

“That’s… good, but I thought I ordered everyone through immediately.” Glaustro’s eyes were literally burning as he glowered at Bronwynn. “And I could swear you waited until the last possible moment.”

I took another look at the pink-skinned demon. Sure enough, the soot marks on his clothes and scars on his hands proved he had been part of the final wave to come through the portal. It looked like he’d tanked a blast of lighting head-on. Even so, the demon genuinely didn’t seem much worse for wear. The scars from the electricity were already fading as I eyed them.

Bronwynn flinched under Glaustro’s scowl, but rather than try and argue, he simply looked around meaningfully at all the gathered demons.

“Very well.” Glaustro closed his eyes briefly in exasperation. “We’ll deal with this… later. For now, all of you are dismissed. I’m sure the lieutenant general will have our rewards distributed soon, but I must report what’s happened immediately.” Already, Glaustro was turning his attention away from the crowd, which parted to let him pass. “You three, follow.”

We did as our commander bid, falling into step with the demon as he hurried away.

“What happens now?” I couldn’t resist the urge to speak. All the new power and feelings invading my headspace were making me jittery. “That wasn’t normal, right? I never felt anything like it on Berlis. Not even when we won.”

“You wouldn’t have. Remember, that world was supremely weak. Its Will wasn’t present already, but just starting to be born. Lagyel is clearly different. It also doesn’t seem to care much for the jinn. This feels almost like the world itself is backing us, though for what reason, I couldn’t tell you.” The demon groaned. “Just one month. One month without stupid, weird shit. That’s all I’m asking.”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Without breaking pace, he turned towards me and narrowed his eyes.

I could only hold his gaze for a few seconds. Then I fidgeted and looked away. “What?”

“This isn’t your fault somehow, is it? I don’t know why, but ever since I took control of the troop you were part of, everything’s been… off.”

Really, I didn’t start sweating. I did not. “How could any of this be my fault? Unless you think I can somehow influence an entire world?”

I offered up a wobbly smile. Glaustro did not look amused.

“Hrm. Well. It remains to be seen. I’m warning you, though. No more nonsense or stupid risk, any one of you!”

To my relief, I wasn’t being singled out anymore. Glaustro pointed at all three of us in turn.

“I solemnly swear I’ll sit pretty,” I volunteered readily. “There’s no reason to sic a cat on me.”

Mia shot me a look, but then she nodded and grumbled along. Bronwynn, on the other hand, merely gave Glaustro a small, innocuous smile.

“Regardless,” the commander snarled, glaring at him, “all of you go get some food and rest. I’m not one hundred percent sure, but I don’t think we’ll like the results of this.”

He must have caught my surprised expression, because he openly laughed. “What? Did you think I would take you along every time I meet with the lieutenant general?”

Well, now that he mentioned it… yes, I was sort of slipping into that mentality. It did seem like my presence was relevant more often than not, these days. Besides, he couldn’t exactly hand over the soul without me there, so…

I froze, suddenly dipping my hand into my purse. My face went pale as I raised shaky eyes to meet Glaustro’s amused ember orbs. “The soul…”

He broke into chortles again. At least his genuine mirth was doing wonders to ease the stress and worry lines from his expression. “Oh, your face. Did you think you’d get the soul every time?” he teased, patting his own soul purse.

My face flushed. I was, in fact, thinking just that.

Am I developing a main character syndrome?

It was a deeply discomfiting thought. If I kept going into situations with the idea that everything would magically work out for me, I was eventually going to run into someone stronger than my overconfidence, and then I’d be dead. Temporarily, of course, but that didn’t matter. I would be missing out on a ton of souls at the very least, not to mention the chances of perishing within the Abyss itself.

Things had been going so well, I was finding it hard to remember that the universe wasn’t a fair place. It was cruel, and dangerous, and would not deliver everything I needed right to my doorstep.

That was a truth I couldn’t afford to forget.

Unwilling to admit any of this, I looked away from Glaustro and focused on the bright blue sky up above. Then I squinted, tilting my head. How could I see the sky? Where was the storm constantly raging all over Lagyel, except in a few cleared patches? Someone must have hunted down and killed the golem turning this part of the world into a sandy hell.

Or had there even been a storm raging over headquarters on my previous visit? I wanted to say yes, but I couldn’t remember for certain. I had been distracted at the time. Besides, my focus was often drifting recently, even when it really shouldn’t.

I felt the tide of newly potent emotions attempting to rise inside my chest and squished it mercilessly, already annoyed enough at how much the recent change had thrown me off.

“Right, then. I’m leaving you here.” Glaustro visibly shook himself. Before my eyes, his expression grew placid, and the emotional cues vanished from his mannerisms. “Wish me luck.”

We all mumbled out something in line with his request, then watched him walk away with worry-filled eyes.

I tried to snap out of it. Even with my paranoia whispering away in my ear, the chances of the meeting going badly for Glaustro were relatively low. We had acted on Crewe’s orders, after all. The destruction of the chains that had bound us on arrival in Lagyel was, overall, a good thing.

Still, demons were not wholly rational on the best of days, so none of us could shed our anxiety.

“Well, I’m going to go… get a drink.” Bronwynn’s excuse was as fake as his smile, but before either Mia or I could say a word, he was already strolling rapidly down the street.

The same street Glaustro had just taken, and which led to Crewe’s lair.

“He’s going to wait for Glaustro in front of the building, isn’t he? Maybe even try to get into the meeting?” I asked conversationally, watching the closest thing I had to a mentor walk away in direct opposition to our commander’s orders.

“Mmmmhmmm,” Mia purred. While the emotion didn’t really show on her face, that single sound reeked of amusement.

I narrowed my eyes at the cat. “And I’m missing something, aren’t I?”

She gave me an actual, wide smile. Her fangs were getting so sharp and pointy that the sight was rather intimidating. The effect was ruined only by the smugness radiating off the brat cat, and my familiarity with her.

“Fine, then, keep your secrets,” I groused, turning towards one of the restaurants we had visited on our first trip to the city. “Let’s get something to eat. I’m so dang tired of rations. I genuinely can’t believe I found them halfway tasty at some point.”

That earned me a shocked face, because obviously those things were barely edible.

It made me briefly wonder about Mia and the past she was so keen on avoiding. My initial acceptance of the rations stemmed from Hayden’s experiences getting jammed into my head, along with all the terrifying things I was going through at the time. It was hard to get upset about food when, as bad as it was, it presented a distraction from how much everything else sucked.

Mia, meanwhile, had been strongly against rations from the beginning. In fact, one of her first purchases was a cooking setup she could lug around.

I snuck a peek at the cat strolling next to me, wishing, not for the first time, that we could just discuss our pasts. Unfortunately, we had more traumas than either of us could count individually. Combining them just didn’t seem like a good idea.

More importantly, I wasn’t willing to admit to her face what a failure of a human being I was. If I did, she would walk away without a second thought. There was nothing anyone could say or do to convince me otherwise.

So, instead, we strolled along in silence. The quiet between us may have been burdened by the many, many things left unsaid, but it was still companionable. Even relaxing.

At least until I caught a glimpse of a spray of sand pelting the city’s protective dome far above our heads.

I immediately looked up with a frown, then froze as I saw more and more streams of sand appear above the dome, relentlessly slamming into our defenses.

“Mia, we need to—”

My words were cut off by the audible rumble of earth deep beneath our feet. In spite of the cataclysmic noise, the street we were on didn’t even shake, but a ripple did spread through the barrier overhead. At the same time, my brand heated up so fast, it bordered on painful.

A single brush against it revealed a message I didn’t like at all.

Gather at base immediately. Prepare for combat.

The jinn response had come faster and more brutally than anyone had anticipated, and as the two of us broke into a sprint, I couldn’t help but wonder what other horrible surprises we were about to receive.