Mana drain resistance advanced to level 20

As expected, no evolution. Worse, my mana still wasn't regenerating. Frustrated, I yanked with as much force as I could muster against my bonds, but this time there was a clunk. Had I loosened them? Or perhaps the lack of mana was weakening me, and as I grew resistant, I was getting some of my strength back.

Employing my manipulate mana skill to fight back against the extraction equipment, I struggled as best as I could, concentrating on one wrist. With a few more clunks and cracks, the wrist iron snapped free, giving me enough movement to tear the device from my stomach.

The rest of the bonds didn't last long after that.

I activated trigger respawn the moment I saw the first sign of blue at the bottom of my vision, with my respawn location set at the capital. Presumably, someone was going to notice that I'd just cut the mana supply, and would be rushing down here to find out what happened. No way was I risking getting caught again without it active, because they'd likely reinforce the restraints next time.

In fact, I didn't intend to get caught at all. This time, I was going to consider this fortress as hostile. I could forgive some initial confusion over my appearance, but being turned into a mana battery after surrendering, despite my letter of safe passage, showed that I had no hope of convincing them to listen to me. The only reason I didn't slit my throat there and then to get out of my cell was because a thief had peeled the beautiful scales from my leg, and I had no intention of letting them turn a piece of me into a trophy.

Instead, I took my magical accessories back out, hoping the ring of regeneration would do something about my leg. I waited a few minutes for mana regeneration, not wanting to get into a fight without my breath attacks, so I took the time to inspect my damage. There was, thankfully, a drain in the floor beneath my table, so I wasn't paddling in my own urine, but it did nothing to reduce the stink.

My descaled leg should have been causing me a lot of pain, according to pain immunity, but it would still take my weight, and everything seemed to be working properly. There was no way the ring would regrow my scales before trigger respawn fired, but hopefully it would keep me walking. The device that had been attached to my stomach didn't seem to have left any wounds on me, either. I wouldn't exactly be recommending this place to any tourists looking for accommodation, but it could have been worse.

Just as I was about to melt the door off its hinges, I picked up three presences approaching at high speed. Letting them open it for me would save me some of my currently sparse mana, so I stepped to the side, ready to melt whoever stepped through. As the presences approached, I heard the jingling of keys and the complaining of voices.

"What if Katie's awake already?" asked someone, confirming that they'd read the letter and ignored it. They hadn't given me a chance to introduce myself by name, so that would be the only way they knew it.

"She won't be. It will take hours for her mana circulatory system to recover enough for her to wake up. Even longer till she can move properly. The supply was only cut off a few minutes ago."

"Yes, but why did it break down? I saw her tank a holy lance, and spears just snapped against her. What if she's resistant to it?"

"She isn't. Believe me, I was the one who plumbed her in, and it had no trouble at all sucking out her mana. Even her magically resistant scales didn't get in the way. It probably couldn't take the high mana currents and overloaded."

"I heard the commander ordered a shield to be made from those scales. I bet he's regretting that now."

Why? What's wrong with my scales? Did they lose their powers when detached? Alas, I'd never get the chance to find out, because by that point they'd reached the door, and I heard the keys clanking in the lock. I took a deep breath in readiness.

The door opened, and I had a brief glimpse of a fancy-armoured soldier beyond before he vanished into the glare of my white-hot flame. There were some screams that suggested others were far enough out of shot to not immediately misplace their corporal form, but still close enough that death had been made a part of their very near future.

There was also a lot of swearing. "Shit! Stop!" screamed someone as I burst through the door, right into a blast of holy magic. It didn't do much to most of me, but tore into my descaled right leg, causing it to buckle beneath me.

"How about no," I muttered, catching myself on an arm as I fell and twisting myself in the required direction to fry the mages.

"Wait!" shouted one, while the other was halfway through a second cast of his holy magic spell. Not exactly a unified strategy there, but they both vaporised equally well under my fire breath.

There had been more than three of them in total, the others too weak to respond to perceive presence. Weak enough that I didn't feel the need to melt them for my own safety.

"Where did my stolen scales go?" I shouted at them, feeling I would be more intimidating if I wasn't on my hands and knees. The corridor was too narrow for flying. I dragged myself up against a wall and pulled myself onto my one good leg. I'd just need to hop, and hope my ring would heal it enough for me to put weight on it again before anyone important saw me.

The soldiers I were addressing just screamed.

"You have five seconds to answer before I turn you into carbonised smears on the wall behind you," I said, not really caring if they knew what carbonisation meant. Did the silhouette when someone got vaporised by a particularly strong burst of heat while standing in front of a wall have a proper name?

They kept on screaming, so I turned them into smears as promised. I didn't really need to, but I was in a bad mood.

How was I supposed to find my scales? I doubted they'd show up to sense mana on their own. An enchanted shield made from them might, but there was far too much other stuff around for me to have a hope of picking it out. Given the room I'd just been in, that wasn't a complete surprise; these humans obviously had some level of magitek.

If this was a prison arc in an RPG, anything taken from me would be in a poorly guarded chest at the end of the cell corridor, but I doubted things would be so convenient here.

Trigger respawn said I had three quarters of an hour left. There was no way I could search the place in that time, so I decided to hunt down the commander of the garrison they'd mentioned. If nothing else, I could flame him as payment for my leg.

Where would a commander be? I hopped along the passage, icing a pair of guards at the end who were stupidly looking outwards instead of inwards, glad of my rainbow breath upgrade. Flame breath might be efficient, but it was very bright and noticeable, so using ice instead was handy for being stealthy. If they'd been my size, I could have stolen their armour in an attempt to blend in, but alas, the humans here had a disappointing lack of wings. I used item box to dress in my stealthy leather outfit instead. I very much doubted I could sneak through the entire fortress, but it might give me a few more seconds.

Would the commander be the strongest presence in the place? That was true of the fox-kin, but in the real world, the position of commander should go to the greatest tactical thinker, not the one with the biggest muscles. Still, there was a presence directly above me that was larger than any other I'd seen in the fortress, so it would be worth a go.

Proficient stealth advanced to level 17

My pessimism about sneaking turned out to be unwarranted. I didn't need to go outdoors, and unlike games, there was a happy lack of guards patrolling the corridors. There were people going about their jobs, but they weren't being vigilant, and it was a simple matter to duck into doorways or cling to the ceiling. I made my way to an upstairs room, inside which was the presence I was hunting, without being spotted once. The fact that the room was guarded, along with the wide, ostentatious doors, suggested I'd found a good lead.

I iced the pair of guards, but the presence inside moved, apparently having noticed my attack. A bell rung out. Dammit!

I burst in, first noticing a human in very fancy armour, with a humongous tower shield in front of him, a drawn sword in his right hand.

The second thing I noticed was that laid out on a desk in the middle of the room was a familiar-looking row of scales, next to an iridescent shield. It was more of a buckler, and hadn't required all the scales they'd taken from me to forge. Finding not only the shield, but also the leftover scales, neatly laid out for me in the exact room I was aiming for came as a surprise, but I wasn't going to turn my nose up at the universe showing me a bit of favour for once. Next to them was a black orb that looked very unimpressive, but shone brightly to perceive mana, along with a bunch of paperwork.

Fortunately, the fancy human seemed stunned by my appearance, and hadn't made a move. I no longer needed to talk to him, so flame breath it was.

Seeing me inhale and aim finally spurred him into action. Mana flowed from him and into his shield, which he raised in front of himself, and I had a brief glimpse of a violet bubble extending from it just as my lance of flame struck out. The fire splashed off his magical shield, melting through the walls beyond. Stray embers ignited bookshelves and furniture. Amazingly, the presumed-commander held, burnt and stunned, but alive. My mana still hadn't completely recovered, so perhaps my breath wasn't back to full strength?

Regardless, with the room on fire and my stealthiness rather thoroughly broken, I took advantage of his immobility to rush to the desk and sweep everything into my item box, including the shield and black orb. No way was I letting anyone keep something made from my stolen body parts, and while I was less interested in the orb, it would be a shame to let such an unprotected magical item burn in a fire.

Perceive presence showed dozens of signatures heading towards me, the garrison presumably treating the alert very seriously. With little time left on my trigger respawn, I saw no need to get into another fight, but I no longer had any easy means of suicide. Besides, I didn't really want to leave a corpse behind for them to harvest, as if I was some sort of monster being dismantled by an adventurers' guild.

I jumped out of the hole I'd burnt through the wall instead, ignoring the pained shouting of the officer behind me, then aimed straight up, gaining as much height as I could. A barrage of spells rained at me, but devoting my body reinforcement to boosting my flight speed, most failed to reach me.

Holy magic tolerance advanced to level 6

The few that did lacked the power to penetrate my scales, although my leg was left mangled, burnt and bloody. My intention had been to detonate myself by inhaling my own flame breath; heat absorption might protect me from the fire, but it would do nothing about the rapidly expanding gas in my lungs, so I assumed I'd still go boom. That turned out to be unnecessary, though, as a familiar yellow light built up above me. The spell Ortho had referred to as judgement. That hadn't even left a smear of blood behind last time, so hopefully it would prove just as effective now.

I stored my armour and items back in my item box as the light struck down from above. It was, thankfully, just as effective as last time.