By the time the Radiant Sun had set beyond the Zarek Mountains, Yuriko, Marron, and Sheamus had moved their fallback point several times to the north. The number of barbarians she’d killed had reached around a hundred, though she supported several imperial squads in their own ambushes.

Not all had gone well, however. At one point, the ambushing party had been surprised by another barbarian raider group and got pincered. She arrived just in time to see the militia team slaughtered. The barbarians didn’t capture any of the women this time and killed them instead. It was a disturbing change in behaviour though she had mixed feelings about it.

On one hand, they stopped treating the women warriors differently, on the other, that meant that there wouldn’t be any mercy. She tracked down the survivors of the clash and wiped them out, though she took the time to observe them.

The usual barbarian bravado was gone and had been replaced by a desperate and frightened air. They clumped up as they walked, closer together than she expected with shoulders brushing against each other. They eyed their surroundings wildly and when they saw her approach, only a few of them leered and most readied their weapons.

The red Mien of terror that sometimes overtook her Anima… well, whenever she was feeling particularly angry or vengeful, froze most of them in their tracks. Curiously, the same thing that happened a few hours ago happened to this group, too. Er, their tight leather pants easily revealed their arousal while their knees knocked together in terror.

The same thing happened every time she encountered and wiped out barbarian raiders. The red Mien appeared, the same reaction even until their last breaths.

Curiously, the red was easier for her to feel, and thus, easier to grasp. Already, after an entire afternoon of focus, she managed to summon it even without great emotion. And…when it was active and stared intently at someone for more than a second, the effect intensified to such an extent that the barbarian would collapse on his knees and either vomit or faint. Curious.

As twilight settled over the forest, the skies lit up with lightning. Thick flurries of snow fell to such an extent that it was all she could see. A purple flare of light in the distance told her where her brother and Sheamus were, nearly half a longstride away. The light pulsed a couple of times before it disappeared.

Her Anima shed golden light to such an extent that she was a beacon in the darkness. She walked for only a couple of minutes before a barbarian group rushed into the clearing she was currently in. She channelled the red and watched them stiffen, and then she killed them simply by throwing metal pellets at their foreheads. As she walked past the corpses, her kinesis easily retrieved the projectiles. She angled her shots downwards where she could, or aimed at trees behind the targets. Otherwise, the pellets would have been lost. As it were, the bunch of hundred were already down to eighty-seven.

She hummed as she walked, heading directly to where she saw Marron’s light. She did have to go over a couple of rises, risking skylining herself over getting lost. Her brother knew how visible their Animus light could be in the darkness, so he hadn’t flared again. As for her own light, she was somewhat hesitant to release the flare. Her outer reserves were nearly full and venting out a thousand extra lumens of Animus would light up the forest more than a bonfire.

As she crossed the second rise, there wasn’t a twinge of a warning. All she felt was something enter her flare, dangerous and hot, and she only had the blink of an eye to react. Her instinct had her condense her Anima immediately, and she focused on the thickest parts behind her. A moment later, the impact slammed into her back and knocked her off her feet. Fire.

She could feel her backpack ignite even though it was under the protection of her Anima. She smothered the flames before they could damage her bag even further, and she tucked herself into a ball and rolled down the hillside, letting the snow cool her down.

As soon as she got to her feet, she leapt to the side. A bolt of brilliant white flame slammed into the snow and turned it into a scalding puff of steam. It rolled off her Anima, pulled as tight around her as she could. It was a good thing her flare had increased over the past weeks as it added an extra layer of protection that was just barely enough to handle the next bolt that slammed at her shoulder.

Growling in anger, she activated the dormant Adamant Guardian Seal she had ready in her Anima and used it to empower her defences. Five more bolts slammed into her, but this time, the heat and the kinetic force were easily ablated.

“Show yourself!” she yelled.

“I’m not hiding,” came the dulcet voice.

From above, at the canopy, a figure wreathed in white flame appeared. It was a pretty woman, with white flames for hair, icy blue eyes, and sunkissed skin. Her robes had several slits and openings that showed off her smooth skin. Her bosom was overlarge too, at least compared to her slender body. More importantly, Yuriko recognised the Chaos Lord as the one atop the behemoth back on the plateau.

“Well done in protecting yourself, young Ancient, but how long can you hold on?”

Yuriko sniffed. “Long enough for you to run out of Chaos.” Her kinesis grabbed several pellets off the pouch hanging on her waist. She invested the bullets with Empowered Strike and let loose.

The woman lurched to the side, pushed aside by a burst of flame. She retaliated by flinging a bolt of white flame. Yuriko growled and batted it away with her sunblade. The bolt was more solid than she thought and her hand shook for a moment at the reverb.

The Chaos Lord pointed at her with a slender finger, and threads of white spun out from the tip. It created spirals as it careened in Yuriko’s direction, separating into a dozen finer threads. They pierced through a tree trunk, which caused the bark to explode. But the attack continued unhindered.

Yuriko flung her sunblade at the woman, then summoned Fri’Avgi to hand. The sunblade spun in the air while she kept the sundagger orbiting around her. She activated Fri’Avgi’s runescript lines and conjured a dozen sunshards and emptied her Radiant reserves in the process. The Radiant Essence in her core belched out more of the energy, but it would take a little while to make more shards.

The sunblade went right through the centre of the spiralling threads, but the Chaos Lord didn’t remain still. She dropped from the air as though whatever held her up there was suddenly gone. The threads moved and caught the sunblade. Contact between the Radiant energy and whatever that flame was resulted in a high-pitched hiss, sharp enough to make both of them wince and lose their focus. The threads unravelled while the sunblade lost its momentum.

The Chaos Lord caught herself before she fell to the snow, a couple of fire blasts burst out of her bare feet and she arrested her fall. But now, she was within reach and not floating a dozen paces up.

Yuriko kicked off the snow, her Anima spread out by her feed to provide enough traction. She preemptively sent her sunshards to harass the woman, who gave her a nasty grin and pointed both of her index fingers at her. The same spiralling threads erupted from the tips, and in the blink of an eye, they were nearly upon her.

Gritting her teeth, she flipped Fri’Avgi so that the broad side of her blade caught the threads. As soon as she felt the impact, she angled Fri’Avgi up and deflected the threads over her head. A couple of strands grazed the condensed Anima above her shoulder. She felt it sizzle against her light, and it melted grooves across it. She hissed at the projected pain, even if it hadn’t touched her at all.

The woman leapt back, howling in laughter even as she avoided Yuriko’s sunshards. She was light on her feet and bursts of flame emerging from her sides, arms, and legs gave her an unorthodox advantage.

Yuriko pressed on, hoping to defeat the woman using her artefact, but the Chaos Lord was just a bit faster retreating than she could move forward. All the while, her foe threw fire threads, and fire bolts at her.

Growling in frustration, she felt her Anima turn red as her Mien focused on the other. The woman stiffened in mid-leap and stumbled upon landing on the snow. Yuriko swatted her with Fri’Avgi, having activated the fourth dance at the same time.

The woman crossed her arms and a wreath of white flame covered her body just as Fri’Avgi’s blade slammed, and broke, her Protective Field. A burst of fire from her heels propelled her in the direction of Yuriko’s blow and that way, she handily avoided a grievous wound.

“Rotter!” Yuriko cussed as she kicked off and pursued, Fri’Avgi held high. Her sunshards curled around the woman and aimed to pincer her movement. The other skidded on the ground, then spread her arms. Flames burst out behind her and deflected the shards, while a larger plume materialised between her hands. A staff…no, a maul appeared, the head was bigger than Yuriko’s, and she spun it around her, culminating in it ending up above her head.

With a wicked grin, she blasted herself forward and slammed the maul down at Yuriko, while another burst of flame came from either side.

Gritting her teeth and glaring fiercely, Yuriko sent the parrying dagger to blunt the force and divert it to the side, then she used Jade Mountain’s second form as well as the second dance to catch the attack along Fri’Avgi’s blade. Her knees bent slightly, lowering at the exact moment the impact happened, and then the flow of Animus within her body absorbed and channelled the kinetic force of the downstroke towards her legs and into the ground. Flurries of snow burst from a pace around her and a pulse radiated from her feet. A moment later, her Anima read the reflected vibrations and inundated her with impressions of objects within a dozen paces, including deep underground. Huh, there was a warren of rabbits underneath the nearby tree.

Some of the reverb bounced back into the woman and she staggered back. Yuriko’s sunblade, which had been floating a couple of paces away but was nevertheless tethered to her Anima, stabbed towards the other.

The woman clicked her tongue and twisted her maul’s haft to deflect the strike, but by then, Yuriko’s Fri’Avgi was ready to counter. She slammed the tip into the woman’s guts, bypassing the maul. The other’s Protective Field flared and pushed her away, but Fri’Avig had cut into the robe and sliced into the belly. Bluish blood seeped out of the gash, which started to widen.

“Good blow. You are, indeed, a worthy quarry.”

The woman didn’t even mind the damage. She squeezed her stomach and closed the wound, but it still wept blood. Then flames emerged and cauterized the flesh.

Fri’Avgi sent a few emotions to Yuriko, mainly confusion and annoyance. The Chaos Lord had resisted the artefact’s devouring power and she grew infuriated. The anger seeped into Yuriko’s mind and tinged her Anima with a bit more crimson.

The woman grinned. However, was that a shudder running through the other’s body?

“You attacked me out of nowhere,” Yuriko growled. “Don’t expect to leave alive.”

“Oh? And what could you do about it, girl?” The woman shot back. Then she cupped her bosom and looked pointedly at Yuriko’s chest. “You’re barely a woman.”

“What does that matter?” Yuriko growled back.

“Ahahaha! A child Ancient indeed.” She shook her head. “Well, that’s all for today, it seems. I’m about out of Chaos.”

Yuriko launched another attack, with both the sunshards, the sunblade, and Fri’Avgi.

Roaring in laughter and derision, the woman shot into the air after a powerful explosion erupted under her feet.

“You will give me a new title, Ancient child. Stay alive until I come for your head!”

“Oh no you don’t!” Yuriko screamed as her kinesis took control of her entire metal pellet stash.

She shot each one at the woman as quickly as she could, not even bothering to invest Empowered Strike into some of the bullets. Each one struck the woman’s Protective Field, and some burst through. She saw a couple of pellets strike an arm, three struck across the overly large bosom, and five struck a thigh. Blue blood burst out of the wounds and some pellets emerged on the opposite side.

But she might as well have been tickling the woman–Firehead she decided to call her–instead of hurting her. Laughter echoed along the coniferous forest until it grew muffled by the falling snow.

Steam rose from Yuriko’s body and from a couple of paces around her as her Anima flared in anger.

“Swarm fodder! Rotting woman!” Yuriko spat out. It took a couple of minutes for her to calm down from her heightened senses. What about the Weaver of the Warp and Weft of the World? Where was he?

“Marron!”

He would have tried to help her, but she hadn’t seen any sign of his covering fire. Instead, when she looked in the direction of their fallback, she saw purple Animus flaring in the darkness, mixed in with Sheamus’ alternating blue and green colour.

And of course, the telltale sounds of battle.