The rest of our preparations went smoothly. Lucille expressed a passing concern about her fellow acolytes but when asked if she was willing to offer something in exchange for their safety, she remained silent. I wasn’t surprised. She didn’t seem to know any of them intimately and her feelings appeared to end at pity.

By the time we left, there weren’t any of the Archmage’s minions waiting outside of the room.

“So, I know that I’m a lowly mortal and I shouldn’t question your plans because you’re my master,” She said, her trepidation clear.

Then don’t.

She didn’t respond as she heard the sound of footsteps. She crouched and her heart rate increased. Carefully, she crept forward straining her eyes to see in the dark hallway. She had asked to conjure a ball of light but I denied her since there was enough light for her to catch glimpses of any threat. Not to mention, I’d notice anything long before it came within her visual range.

She reached the end of the hall within a few seconds, her steps light and quick under the effects of the Physical Empowerment technique alongside the optimizations applied to her body. A peeked around the corner revealed a single man walking away from her current position. She made to move but I stopped her with an order.

Mana Bolt. Above. Ceiling corner to your left, I rattled off. She didn’t hesitate much to my pleasure.

A single Mana Bolt burst from her finger blasting apart the section of the ceiling it hit. The living shadow with the darkness dispersed with a puff of dark gas as the mana could no longer hold its form.

As she sensed the mana dissipating, she asked, “How come I didn’t—"

Attack coming from below, I said cutting her off. She rolled into the hall just as a mass of black hands extended from the floor where she previously stood. Another Mana Bolt flew from her hand finishing the insubstantial creature. She had no time to rest though as I warned her of the most prominent. Down the hall.

The man ran in her direction arm extended. His eyes were black as an inky void and his dark veins strained against the pallor of his gaunt face. A torrent of black hands erupted from his palm toward Lucille.

Drop. Mana Bolt at his legs.

Again, she followed my orders. She fell onto the floor laying flat and the dark hands passed over her. One made to grab at her hair which whipped up as she descended but the Threefold Barrier blocked it from getting any purchase. She aimed with her right arm braced against the floor and let loose a shot. The Mana Bolt missed anything vital merely ripping a chunk from the unfortunate man’s leg.

Draw your athame, I said, almost immediately after her shot left her finger. She fumbled for the blade as she tried to get back to her feet but the enemy wasn’t going to wait around.

The possessed husk ignored the injury as it charged Lucille’s prone form. By the time she removed the ritual knife from its sheathe on her belt, her opponent was on top of her. He barreled into her attempting to knock her onto the floor again and were it not for her enhanced physique, he would’ve succeeded. She kept her feet under her but remained unbalanced as he shoved his hand into her face, his palm covered in writhing darkness.

Left arm up. Clockwise sweep. Athame into the throat, I said calmly as her adrenaline levels spiked and her nerves frayed in the face of a direct assault.

My instructions anchored her nerves preventing them from getting too out of hand. She brought her arm up, barely in time to stop the man from touching her face with whatever foul sorcery that he wielded. She swept the strike into the wall causing a web of darkness to splay over it from the man’s palm. At the same time, her right hand thrust upward punching her athame into the center of his throat, once and again, a second time.

The gory stabbing sent blood all over her arm but she wasn’t finished. She twisted using the knife in the man’s throat as a macabre control stick to pull him off balance. He grabbed at her with his free arm but she drove a vicious punch into his temple with her left hand causing his grip to falter. With a grunt, she shoved him onto the floor, let go of her knife, and shot a Mana Bolt into his chest with the same hand.

Her breath came in heavy gasps, mostly due to anxiety and adrenaline. A quick check of her respiratory system revealed no issue with her remaining stamina. When the host died, I caught the astral being tethered to him before it could escape and tore it apart though Lucille was none the wiser.

Good job, you handled that well. Now—

“Why don’t I feel anything for killing him? I knew this guy. We… He was always flirting with me. And now he’s dead,” she said before I could give further instructions. I decided to let the interruption pass given the circumstances.

I’m inhibiting some of your mental limiters at the moment so you won’t hesitate when the situation becomes unpleasant or visceral.

“That…,” she started to say but trailed off. “You said ‘at the moment’, does that mean you’re going to turn them back on after this?”

Yes, I responded. While those limiters often hold you humans back, I’ve learned that they are necessary given your species’ social nature and you’re of more use to me if you aren’t a pariah.

“Well, thanks I guess?” she said. “This is so weird… And why is it so easy to follow your instructions? Are you hypnotizing me or something?”

No. I’m speaking to your soul as well as your mind so you intuitively know what to do when I command you; additionally, I infused mana into your nervous system to increase its effectiveness. Increased response time is one of the benefits.

“So… I’m like a super-soldier?”

In a sense, I suppose, although soldier isn’t a term I’d use given your subpar combat training.

“Hey! I’ve taken H.E.M.A. lessons that has to—"

Get moving. We’re wasting time, I commanded stopping her mid-sentence. I found it surprisingly easy to get engrossed in conversation with the young woman, mostly because I’d gone so long without speaking to anyone or anything but souls which while insightful on an existential level weren’t very engaging topically. Also, there was much I wished to know about the current age and some of the terms she used. I could feel a similar desire to ask all manner of questions in the back of her mind as well. Sadly, we had an engagement with a possessed Archmage to handle before we could indulge a bit.

She obeyed falling into a light jog in the direction of the stairs. With my aid, she dispatched several more living shadows lying in wait to ambush her in the halls while she ran.

“Why can’t I sense the mana in those shadow creatures?”

They are skilled at hiding their mana signatures and their method defies conventional techniques used to pierce concealment. For now, leave detecting them to me. Next time you meditate, review the book I had you create within your mind’s eye. There is a technique for detecting these weaker creatures in there.

“Alright.” She stopped at the corner of an intersection looking down each hallway for potential enemies. Seeing none, she turned down the hall with the entrance to the stairwell at the end. “By the way, what should I call you? Master, Patron, Great Old One…”

She seemed amused with herself for some reason but it was a good question. I never saw a reason to give myself a name in the past since I had other ways of identifying myself to others; however, I had also been divorced from my sentimental attachment to humans and thus, human traditions like naming an individual. That was no longer the case.

I had given my companion a name, Libbu, and had referred to her by that same name in my thoughts since I integrated her core structures into my body. As I thought about it, she reached the stairwell and pushed open the door. The darkness within yawned like a cavernous maw as I remembered Libbu’s words as she expressed her love.

An. You may call me An.

I chose the word for “sky” in the first language that Libbu and I spoke to each other in so many years ago. I wanted to continue to be the “sky that gave her hope”. It encapsulated my journey over the millennia rising above all others in the hopes of restoring her. What I didn’t expect was for Lucille to recognize the meaning of the name I gave her or for that name to have a history of its own.

She stumbled while going up the steps but caught herself on the railing. “Wait, An? As in the father god of Mesopotamia?”

Father god? I asked giving her a mental nudge to keep going.

Even had we not been psychically communicating, I’d have recognized the term “Mesopotamia. It was the name the Greeks used for the land where Libbu made her home for many centuries and where human civilization truly began to flourish.

“Yeah, An was the father of the gods, demons, and evil spirits,” she explained as she crested a flight of stairs. “I don’t know much else. I don’t—”

Duck, I warned. She didn’t react fast enough and a torrent of black hands slammed into her torso and face smashing her into the nearby wall. The stone cratered from the impact pushing her a few inches into its surface. The Threefold Barrier drained nearly twenty percent of her mana capacity to absorb the damage, an impressive amount considering how efficient the technique was mana-wise. Without the Threefold Barrier, she would have died. To your knees. Two Mana Bolts, middle of the stairs.

She easily slipped the grip of the black hands thanks to the Threefold Barrier’s second layer which foiled physical constructs made of mana. However, having been thoroughly rattled by the impact, she only managed to get one Mana Bolt off which went wide as she dropped to her knees. She met the gaze of her attacker who stood in the middle of the next flight of stairs where I had told her to shoot. A giant mass comprised of undulating dark hands extended out of her torso covering her left arm.

“Sorcerer-Adept Amalia!” Lucille said.

The Sorcerer-Adept showed no reaction to her cry, unsurprisingly. Instead, she ripped the large shadow appendage from the wall and swung it at the acolyte.

Lucille dodged rolling to the base of the stairs and aiming her hand at Amalia’s center of mass. She hesitated. A mix of emotions battled against her resolve when she saw the possessed woman; affection, sadness, regret, and anger seeking to make themselves the dominant emotion. It was enough for her opponent to launch another attack.

Focus. We can capture her alive. I said, simultaneously redirecting her attention and reading her desires from her soul before she could bother asking. Charge her. Hesitate and you die.

Amalia’s hand flashed with purple fire as the black mass twisted toward Lucille cutting off her escape path. The acolyte ran up the steps releasing a battle cry to psych herself up. A stream of violet flames engulfed the staircase causing every part of her lower brain functions to ordered her retreat. Thankfully, I had rendered many of those base instincts inert and her resolve took care of the rest.

She barreled into the Sorcerer-Adept as her mana levels dropped to almost-empty. The fire attack stopped abruptly as its source lost focus on the technique. She continued her charge with one hand gripping the woman’s robes and the other wrapped around her face. Against Lucille’s improved and enhanced physique, the possessed woman buckled under the pressure being dragged along.

Still screaming, Lucille slammed her opponent into the wall, head first, then pivoted bearing the pair into the ground until she straddled her former superior, one hand on her face and the other holding down the arm that had launched the flames.

I inserted a thin but dense strand of psykhe into the possessed woman’s soul to establish a connection. Immediately, the invader resisted snarling within the tatters of the woman’s soul and lashing out with its mana. The possession was so brutal that its attack would have injured Amalia’s soul further if it had been against a less skilled opponent. I dismantled the hostile mana almost as fast as it was brought to bear and whispered to the possessed woman’s soul.

Help me free you.

Like a drowning woman, the soul obliged latching onto the thread of psykhe instead of continuing its hopeless fight against the astral being. Once the connection was established, I forcibly ripped the astral being out leaving its destruction to my automated sub-cores. The removal of the invader caused more damage but I funneled psykhe and pure mana into her soul at a ratio of one to three which would allow her soul to regenerate over the next few days as opposed to the years it would take otherwise. I could’ve healed the damage right then and there but an expenditure of mana, especially my specialized mana, that large would attract the attention of the entity possessing Archmage Joseph. For now, I needed to be discreet.

The black mass of writhing hands disappeared once the astral being lost control of Amalia. Rather than silence, the stairwell was filled with the whimpering sobs of the Sorcerer-Adept as her newly-freed mind tried to rationalize the extreme trauma her soul had endured.

Lucille pulled the woman into a hug transitioning from aggression to solace in a matter of seconds.

“It’s ok, Lia. I’ve got you. I won’t let get you again,” she said as the other woman wept and mumbled incoherently. After several seconds, she squeezed Amalia tight and pressed a finger to the back of her head releasing the sleep-inducing technique I had taught her to incapacitate her fellow acolytes. Due to the sorceress’s weakened condition, she succumbed instantly going limp in Lucille’s arms.

“What will it take for her protection?” she asked as she stood.

You have nothing else to give that would interest me, I answered.

“Please, An.” Her eyes lingered on Amalia’s unconscious form then flitted to the various shadows. “I… She doesn’t deserve this. She’s always looked out for me and I—”

Hush, girl. I will do this for you as your patron but do not rely on such generosity in the future.

“Thank you so—,” she said but I took control causing her to pause, likely due to shock as she became a passenger in her body.

I bent down next to Amalia and traced a triangle on her forehead. As the mana took root within her body, I stepped back forming a pyramid with my hands. The gestures were more for show and more for Lucille’s benefit since I sensed her paying close attention to the movement of her mana. The technique was a bit too advanced for her but watching it could prove insightful.

A tetrahedron of white light surrounded the unconscious woman. The defensive structure had three layers similar to the Threefold Barrer but with certain differences keyed to the situation. For instance, Lucille could pass through the barrier without issue among other things.

I ceded control back to her afterward, the entire endeavor taking less than three seconds.

She stared at the triangular pyramid of light and glanced at the ruined staircase which had been scorched in some places and melted in others. Then, she looked at her hands, a sensation akin to wonder floating in her soul.

“You know, some of the Order’s scholars believe that the gods and demigods of mythology really existed but that they were just powerful sorcerers who ran amok in the ancient world,” she said taking a deep breath. “I know you said you weren’t a god but… how can you control mana like that? How do you know spells like these? How can you just make me a sorceress? Are you—"

Now is not the time for this, I cut in. We have an Archmage to face.

“But I have almost no mana left.”

Worry not. I guaranteed your survival, did I not?

“You did.”

Then go. Time is precious.

She threw one last look at Amalia before taking off up the last two flights of stairs. Her soul thrummed with reinforced determination and something else, a very difficult emotion to inspire. All traces of apprehension within her mind vanished.

Meanwhile, I tried not to dwell on a troubling dilemma. I hadn’t sensed Amalia until we were close enough for her to launch an attack on Lucille. Given the strength of the astral being possessing the Sorcerer-Adept, that shouldn’t have been possible. And as if that weren’t enough, I sensed multiple mana signatures in the penthouse but one had disappeared during the confrontation with Amalia.

I couldn’t sense the Archmage.