When I returned to the window, there was a relieving lack of screaming going on, but I saw a number of the priestesses congregating around the warrior commander, who stood out quite spectacularly, being a couple of heads taller than any of the others.

"How is she?" I asked, walking up to the group.

The priestesses parted, revealing the girl. Her clothes were torn and her expression haunted, but her wounds were healed, the black veins had gone and she was awake. "Here, a present for being brave," I said, placing the spider queen's mana crystal into her hands, noting how she twitched at the touch. She glanced at me, but didn't speak.

"That potion of yours saved her," said Do'myrith. "I didn't know such a miracle was possible, aside from the prayers of Dru'niryeal. Where did you find such a thing?"

"The abyss. There's a demon alchemist who sells them."

I felt the incredulity spread behind me as I watched the girl. "Incidentally, they really dislike people using 'the abyss' as a means of swearing," I added. "Now, let's get out of here before anything else decides to attack."

I changed into my nightie, on the basis that the familiar clothing might help the people on the other side recognise me despite my mutations, while the fox-kin formed up into lines stretching the width of the window. It wasn't as wide as I'd have liked, and I foresaw a nasty crush on the other side, but there was enough space for everyone to get through. It was just unfortunate that the time dilation meant I couldn't head in first and warn them about the incoming fox-kin. Once everyone was in position, I held my hand against the window and pushed.

There was the noise of shattering glass, but it was far louder than it should have been, with strange echoes and reverberations that continued on even after the full window had shattered.

"Go!" I shouted above the continuing noise, spreading my wings and leaping up out of the way. Row after row of fox-kin stepped through the window, freezing on the other side as time shifted, but being pushed forward anyway by the next row to pass through. I waited for them all, then flew above them, straight into a scene of chaos.

New respawn point activated

"A demon attack!" yelled shouty-guy, backing away as the trio of shiny knights drew their weapons. "They've penetrated the castle! Sound the alarm! They have a half-dragon!"

Right, even with my nightie, I suppose the wings and scales give rather the wrong impression. Still, it could be worse; at least I wasn't throwing my flame breath around the room.

Most fox-kin were trying to stay away from the trio of knights, who were stepping forward despite being so heavily outnumbered, but some warriors led by the commander had drawn their own weapons, and I felt mana from the mages.

"Stop fighting!" I yelled, but I had no hope of out-voluming shouty-guy. I saw one of the knights aiming for a fox-kin woman who had been pushed forward in the time-dilated crush, and swooped down to grab the sword from his hand, shoving him backward straight into the fleeing shouty-guy, bowling them both to the floor.

"I'm your summoned hero, dammit!" I yelled, now that my well-aimed knight missile had cut the ambient noise of the room.

I tried to keep myself between the fox-kin and the other two knights, who turned to face me, swords still readied in their hands.

"I assume you can speak, yes? Look, I may have wings and scales and whatnot, but my face is the same. I hope. My nightie certainly is."

"What nonsense is this?!" exclaimed shouty-guy, floundering on the floor, pinned under the weight of his own impractical robes and one crumpled knight. "You! What did you do?! You betrayed us for the demons?!"

"Will you cut out all the shouting about demons? You're the one who sent me on that 'simple' fetch quest without bothering to check what my blessing was first. Do you have any idea what I've been through in the past few months?"

"Of course not! How would I know what you did before we summoned you?"

"After, not before. It may only have been seconds for you since I went to fetch your sword, but for me, it's been months!"

With the immediate threat of stabbings having receded, I took a look around. I'd had a message about a new respawn point, which suggested my immortality cheat was still in effect. A quick browse of my internal list of selectable points only showed one, though, so I'd lost my link to any from the other world.

The altar was empty, the sword gone, and none of my perception skills picked up anything unusual. There were no signs of a barrier or anything magical.

The stained glass window was shattered, but through the resulting hole I could see nothing but blue sky. There was no sign of the cave. It did, of course, mean that the fox-kin were standing on quite a lot of broken glass, but I could worry about that later. They all had shoes.

All my skills were intact, and I could still access my status. I could pull a dagger from my item box and restore it. Even my minimap still worked, showing a single room labelled 'shrine'. In all, I'd made the transition between worlds perfectly.

"Perhaps you should explain," said shouty-guy, employing a more reasonable volume for once as he climbed back to his feet. It was an impressive display. I was expecting one of the knights to need to fetch a winch or a small crane, but there he was, managing it all on his own. "You vanished, along with the sword, then not ten seconds later you burst in through the window, along with a large group of demons, and you look like... well, that."

"When I stepped through the barrier, I was teleported to a pocket dimension containing a single, six-floor dungeon. Then lots of things killed me, even more things seemed determined to trap me in increasingly surreal bondage predicaments, and a couple of them tried to rape me or otherwise force me to incubate their babies. Then it turned out that the whole pocket dimension was tied to your sword, and if I took it, everyone there would die. So I decided to leave the sword there and fight the demon lord myself instead. These are some refugees I promised to help find their kin on this side. They aren't demons."

"They're a slave race created by one of the demon lord's generals. A red dragon. Thanks to how easily they can disguise themselves as humans, small bands of them are forever sneaking across our border. Tens of villages have been burnt down by them in the past few weeks alone. Scores killed."

Oh... Well, that's awkward. Stupid me for assuming the real versions of the fox-kin would be on the human's side.

"That red dragon. He wouldn't happen to be the demon lord's brother, too?" I asked. "And the demon lord is a black dragon, right?"

Shouty-guy recoiled in surprise. "No human has ever seen the demon lord and lived, but yes, the red general has claimed blood relations."

"Yeah, not a surprise if looking at the demon lord has the same effect as it did back in there... Not that it should do. The real one shouldn't have Void powers."

Wow. So... Just wow. The backstory was real?!

"Wait, so does the blight exist here, too?"

"The what?"

Guess not. "Right, I've missed out far too much here. Let's start from the beginning."

I took a few steps forward and curtsied, still wearing my nightie, but at least this time having clean silk underwear on underneath. "Nice to meet you. I'm Katie."

"Oh. Right. Kevin. Likewise."

I needed to stifle a snort of laughter. Kevin?! That was as bad as Katie!

"Right. You sent me to get a sword, but barely explained anything. Things didn't quite work out, and now you have no sword, but do have a whatever the hell I am now. Rainbow dragon thing. I'm strong, certainly more so than the girl you met a few minutes ago who wouldn't even kill a kitten, and I'll do what I can to end the war. But first, I need to know what I'm getting involved in. I've made enough bad decisions to last me my lifetime already, so I want to know your history, why there's a fight, what other civilisations there are on this world, and anything else that's pertinent first. I don't even know where I am."

Maybe the knights really were mute, given that none of them had spoken yet. Or maybe they were golems, and there weren't actually real people under all that plate mail. They did all respond to perceive presence, so they were something the skill considered living. Maybe they were all just incredibly stoic.

Actually, now that I checked my sensory skills, there were a lot of detectable presences around, many of whom were heading straight for us. They must have heard the shouting, or else an alarm was raised somehow. None were anywhere close to my level, though, which was encouraging.

Kevin sighed. "How did a five-minute hero summoning become so complicated? Fine, we can have a longer conversation, but first we need to deal with this invasion."

"Weren't you listening? It's not an invasion. They're with me! And perhaps you should do something about all the others rushing towards this room before something regrettable happens."

"They're the enemy. I don't blame you for not knowing, given that we didn't give you any information, but now you know better. Stand aside."

"How can they be your enemy? They came from another world! They didn't even know what humans were!" I shouted.

Was every decision I made going to fail? In retrospect, I shouldn't have even made the offer. I knew nothing about this world. The soul link had been revealed to me thanks to my new class, and I'd just been so desperate to redeem myself. And, as always, I made things worse.

The door burst open, and more knights stormed in. I judged the fox-kin forces to be stronger, but they had non-combatants with them. And even if they won this battle, we were still inside a castle. And the castle was presumably inside a town. Even if they did make it out, the cost on both sides would be horrendous.

"Wherever they came from, they're still slaves of the demon lord's army."

Obviously the fox-kin behind me were not just standing around waiting to be attacked, and had shuffled around, leaving a row of melee fighters in front, ranged fighters and mages behind, and civilians and children cowering at the back.

"You worship the same Goddess, for crying out loud!"

"Even the worst of devils know she exists, and would beg for her mercy."

Weapons were being brandished all around. This was insane! I'd intended to bring them to safety, not start a large scale fight.

"The first side to attack will be my enemy, so everyone calm down!" I shouted.

"A freshly summoned hero? I hardly think that's much of a..."

Kevin aborted mid sentence as I directed a burst of ice breath over the top of his head, then he carefully turned around and inspected the frozen wall behind him.

"Fresh for you, months for me, remember? Also, as you said, half dragon. And the other half isn't entirely human anymore, either."

"Err, perhaps we should just..."

Another set of knights rushed into the room, one of them in substantially fancier armour than the others.

"Demons!" he exclaimed, raising his sword.

Crap...

Shouty-guy's overpowering voice cut through the commotion, yelling, "Wait!" at a volume high enough to vibrate the surviving windows, but the knight didn't. His sword shone brightly as he raised it overhead.

Pushing my manipulate mana skill to the maximum, I accelerated toward him, bringing a chitin shield from item box and placing it right in front as his sword swung downwards. It impacted in a blinding flash, cleaving the shield in two and sending me stumbling backward.

New skill gained: Holy magic tolerance

Never underestimate the power of belief. Strong enough faith can be wielded as effectively as any sword, burning those the user perceives as evil. This skill will help you withstand the assault.

The torrent of yellow magic flowed past me, but despite my lack of a resistance skill, I was left relatively unharmed. Perhaps my scales had deflected it, or perhaps my light and heat resistances had helped.

The screaming and stench of burnt flesh behind me informed me that the fox-kin had not been so fortunate, and turning around, I saw a dozen of them lying on the ground. My eyes met those of the girl whose name I had refused to learn, her right arm missing, along with a significant chunk of her torso. I saw the look of incomprehension frozen onto her face as she collapsed.

I felt the blow to my arm, the knight taking advantage of my distraction to launch an attack. My scales cracked, and he drew blood, but the wound was shallow. I ignored it, all sensation drowned by my anger. I suddenly knew with perfect clarity which skill I was going to enhance.

Skill enhanced: Draconic breath (rainbow)

You can empower your breath with a wide range of effects, each with all the strength of an elder dragon

"Burn," I commanded as I slowly turned around, and the humans complied.