Damien’s hands trembled as Henry forced the boy’s body to remain in place. Ropes of dark energy whipped around the fallen Corruption Seed, binding it tightly and forcibly sealing the gaping wounds covering it.

Henry dug through the creature’s corpse, ignoring its hisses and clicks. He ripped seemingly random portions of its body free. Shadows enveloped it, shredding the parts to sickly green motes of light before sending them flooding into Sylph’s chest.

The mantis screeched as Henry ripped its body apart, thrashing desperately against the bindings. They didn’t budge. The Seed was too weakened to do anything but watch. Cracks started to spread through its body.

Stone faded and started to crumble. The acid covering the creature receded as well as it ran out of Ether to fuel it. Henry reached deeper and deeper into the monster, taking every last bit of energy it had left to offer.

With one last screech, the mantis slumped to the ground. Its limbs went slack and it crumbled into a pile of powder. Henry shoved the last bit of Ether into Sylph’s body, then enveloped her with his energy.

Magic crackled around her like a miniature bonfire. The faint traces of Ether within her body were desperately fighting back against the foreign energy that Henry had introduced. Ironically enough, her core hadn’t been damaged in this fight. The void creature reached out, corralling all the Ether remaining in her core and body before absorbing it into himself.

Once Sylph’s body had been completely purged, he pressed the mantis’ ether into her core. Even without her consciousness there, Sylph’s body resisted him. If her core hadn’t been filled with cracks from when she’d accidentally broken it a few weeks ago, it would have been impossible.

Fortunately, that wasn’t the case. The gaps in her core widened as Henry’s mental energy wormed into them, pulling them apart and forcing the green Ether inside. Once it was completely full, Henry pressed the cracks back together.

He sent the remaining Ether throughout her body, infusing it into her muscles and skin. It resisted him, but Henry was not one to be disobeyed. Slowly, more and more of the energy merged with Sylph.

When only a single mote of the energy remained, Henry cast one last glance over his work. At his firm insistence, Sylph’s body had already started to adapt to the new energy. The wound on her chest still dripped blood, but the flesh around it had started to turn grey.

It slowly knitted itself back together, strands of green ether forming within the wound like a web. Henry refocused himself and wrapped his energy around the last mote of green Ether. In a single clean strike, he thrust it into Sylph’s heart.

The artifact companion she had within her finally took offense to the abuse that Henry was putting her body through. A wave of energy rose up to repel Henry. He ignored it and enveloped the artifact with his own Ether, crushing its defenses and shattering it.

Her body jerked. Lines of green light shot out across her skin, running down through her limbs before bouncing back up and returning. Her core pulsated and the wound on her chest pulled itself shut.

The gray flesh started to seal back over, returning to its normal, slightly tanned color. Sylph convulsed and drew in a ragged gasp, one last flash of green energy lighting up her eyes before it faded. She doubled over Damien’s shoulder, retching up vile black liquid.

Henry gently pushed her back and held her by the shoulders in front of him. Aside from the blood covering her and the black sludge on her mouth, she looked normal.

“Who are you?” Henry asked, shaking her gently. “Answer quickly.”

“S-sylph. I’m Sylph.”

“And who am I?” Henry asked, watching her expression closely for any signs of the Corruption’s presence.

“Damie – no. You’re Henry,” Sylph said, her eyes widening. “What happened? How am I alive? I was bleeding out – and then there was nothing. I should be dead. Did a healer get here?”

“Something like that,” Henry said. “Do you feel any different?”

“In more ways than I can describe,” Sylph said, her eyes unfocused. Henry shook her gently.

“Nope. No digging around until everything settles down. Trust me, you don’t want to see what I did yet.”

Sylph swallowed, then nodded once. She glanced at the crumbled remains of the mantis beside them, then down at the blood covering both her and Damien.

“Any strong desires to kill children?” Henry asked. “Or cravings to destroy the world?”

“I wouldn’t mind destroying some food, but I think that’s it,” Sylph said. Her stomach rumbled. “I’ve never been this hungry in my entire life.”

“Side effects. The least of them, I think,” Henry said. “Look, my time here is up. I can’t explain everything, nor can I allow anyone to learn of my presence. Damien’s body is an inch from giving out. Get him out of here and get the blood off both of you before those mages find you. Don’t tell them about the mantis. Got it?”

“Understood,” Sylph said. “And thank you for saving my life. Again.”

“You saved Damien’s first,” Henry replied. “And it goes without saying – not a word about my existence. And, if you can avoid it, don’t use your Ether. There might be some… significant differences.”

Before Sylph could ask what Henry meant, Damien’s body slumped forward. Sylph caught him. The field fell silent. She sat there for nearly a minute before finally urging her aching body into motion.

Sylph slung Damien over her shoulders like a bag of bloody potatoes and started trudging towards a stream in the distance, leaving the pile of rocks and the pool of blood behind them.

When she reached the river nearly thirty minutes later, Sylph eased Damien’s body into it and slipped in after him, holding him against the bank to make sure it didn’t wash him away. Luckily, the runes on his mage armor made it incredibly easy to clean.

Sylph dragged Damien back onto dry ground once the last of the blood left his clothing. Her own clothes were completely ruined. Without the cleaning runes that Damien’s armor had, there was no way to get the blood out of them just using water. There was soap in her pack, but she doubted it would do much.

She reached into her travel pack, pulling out a change of clothes. She stripped, bundling her bloody clothes into a ball by her side. The wrappings that covered her torso had a huge hole in the center where the mantis’ claw had gone through her.

Sylph ran a hand across the wound, frowning slightly before pulling her new set of clothes back on. She grabbed her toothbrush and scooped some water from the river, scrubbing her mouth vigorously and spitting it out in the grass.

The water came out a disturbing grey tint. Sylph grimaced and repeated the process several times until her saliva was clear again. With a shudder, she wiped the toothbrush off and put it away.

Then she laid back on the ground beside Damien, staring up into the sky. The sun had already risen behind them, and its warming rays slowly worked the water out of their clothes.

Two hours had passed by the time Damien stirred again. He groaned, blinking the sun out of his eyes. Every single part of his body felt like Delph had been beating on it, and the grass pressing against his hands and the back of his neck was ticklish.

He turned over, grimacing. Sylph laid to his side; her hair spread out around her head in an attempt to get it to dry faster.

“Are you okay?” Sylph asked.

“I was about to ask you the same thing,” Damien replied, too tired to bring any tone but exhaustion into his words. “What in the seven planes just happened?

“I was about to ask you the same thing,” Sylph replied, a small grin flickering across her face. “But it looks like we both survived. Somehow.”

“Not through any lack of trying on your end,” Damien said, craning his neck to look at her. “You could have killed yourself! If Henry hadn’t done… well, whatever he did, you were dead.”

“And you would have died if I hadn’t done it,” Sylph said. “That makes us even.”

“I… honestly, I’m too tired to argue it right now. Have the mages found us yet?”

“No,” Sylph said, pushing herself into a seated position. “I’ve been trying to figure out what to tell them. We’ve been missing for several hours now. We need an explanation as to where we went, and I can’t really say what happened.”

“What a pain in the ass,” Damien muttered, letting his head fall back onto the grass. “Can’t we just walk back home and pretend this didn’t happen?”

“I’m not sure that’s the best idea. I think you might have gotten rattled a bit too hard. Maybe just rest for a little longer. I’ll figure something out.”

“Okay,” Damien muttered sleepily. His focus drifted as he watched the clouds drift through the sky above him.

Time twisted and slipped by. A headache came and went with the clouds above Damien, making it impossible for him to concentrate for more than a few moments at a time. The sweet release of sleep soon rose back up to meet him and he lapsed into unconsciousness once more.

No sooner than he’d fallen asleep, Damien felt someone gently nudge him. He scrunched his nose up. “What?”

“I’ve got a plan. Are you coherent enough for me to explain it?” Sylph asked.

Damien blinked up at the sky. Her words were fuzzy and seemed to slip right through his head. “I… don’t know.”

“Right,” Sylph said. “Just go along with what I say, then. Okay?”

Damien managed a nod. Sylph gave him a worried frown. She scooted closer to him and gently lifted his head, looping her other arm under his shoulders and helping him to his feet. Damien leaned heavily on Sylph as they rose, darkness tickling the edges of his vision.

“Are you okay?” Sylph asked.

“A bit dizzy. Should be fine.”

“Just hold on, then. And don’t speak.”

“I can do that.”

Sylph cleared her throat. “Pickles.”

A few moments passed in silence. Then the air crackled. Volt and the other mages appeared, their weapons drawn and Ether hissing around them. They were all covered in blood and bandages, and their eyes were wild. Gavel surged forward, taking up position behind Sylph and scanning the area. He blinked when no enemies showed themselves.

“What happened? Why did it take so long for you to respond?” Volt demanded.

“And are you injured?” Tenbi added, giving them a worried glance.

“Damien got hit in the head, but he’s recovering,” Sylph said. “After we ran away, another one of those stone creatures appeared. It looked like a smaller one of the monster that you were fighting. We tried to fight it for a little, but it was too strong. We just ran as fast as we could. However, after about an hour, it just crumbled to dust and died.”

“How come you didn’t summon us?” Volt asked, frowning.

“A big rock clipped me as I went down,” Sylph replied, pushing her hair back to reveal a painful looking lump on her head. “Knocked me out. Damien went down at about the same time as well, and I only just woke up. I panicked a little and tried to wake him up as well before calling you guys.”

Tenbi knelt in front of Damien and held a finger up. She moved it back and forth, watching him carefully.

“He does look like he might have a concussion,” Tenbi said. “We need to get them to a healer.”

“They’re not in bad shape for fighting one of those monsters, even if all they did was run,” Yaga observed. “Impressive.”

“It sounds like the monster had the ability to duplicate itself,” Gavel said. “Maybe clones of some sort. I didn’t think it would be that strong.”

“There were a lot of surprises today,” Tenbi said darkly. “Two students nearly died for this, and we were grossly unprepared for how dangerous that thing was.”

“Someone will answer,” Volt agreed. “However, it appears that we’ve gotten the best case scenario. Our wayward students have survived and the monster is dead. Come. We need to get the two of you to a healer.”

Volt reached out and grabbed both of them. The other mages huddled around him and they all disappeared in a flash of light.

They popped out inside a large wooden room full of beds. The walls were painted white, and an older woman with graying hair and a hunchback stood beside one of the beds, feeding a patient in it something. She glanced up, not even slightly surprised at the party’s sudden arrival.

“What did you do this time, boy?” the old woman asked, snatching a cane from the wall beside her and hobbling towards them.

“Not me,” Volt said. “Students on the quest with us. They need a quick examination. One might have a concussion.”

The woman’s eyes widened as the mages stepped aside, revealing Damien and Sylph. She hobbled over to them, her eyes tightening in anger.

Energy gathered at the tip of her staff and she held it next to Damien. Her gaze grew unfocused for a few moments. Then she moved the staff to point at Sylph. A small amount of energy flowed out of the staff and into Sylph, easing the bump on her head. The old woman lowered the staff and sighed.

“They’re both fine. What are you doing, involving students in dangerous matters?”

“They could have just gotten injured in a normal quest,” Volt said defensively. “How do you know that it was dangerous?”

“You wouldn’t have come to your old mother’s house if it wasn’t urgent,” the woman snapped. “You never visit, you ingrate. Besides, when was the last time your group worked on a normal quest? Students have no business working with you.”

“We were under orders, and they made their own decision,” Volt said, pressing his lips together.

“Well, I’m going to make the decision to fit my cane up your ass if you keep that attitude,” the woman said. “Now stop being a brat and go set the dinner table.”

“Mom, we’re on a tight schedule–”

The woman raised her staff and gave the pointed end a pointed glance. Volt snapped his mouth shut and mechanically strode out of the room through a small door behind them. The other mages chuckled at his expense, but they shut up when the woman’s glare shot to them.

“You best go help him before I redecorate all of your faces,” she said. “Bah, involving students in dangerous quests. Whose idea was that? Whisp?”

Gavel cleared his throat and nodded before he and the others beat a hasty retreat after Volt. Sylph, as tired and worn out as she was, hid a laugh as the trained mages fled from an old woman who barely stood past their shoulders.