Aexilica had almost died, and it had taken every ounce of her willpower to save herself. The blow she'd been struck by would have killed her outright, she knew, had it not been for Emma's potion burning away in her belly and adding strength to her body. More physical power was one thing, even more speed, but the mystical concoction seemed to make the very substance of her flesh and bone tougher, as if it had been replaced by some entirely more resilient material.

She wasn't complaining of course, any less than that and she'd have already been made a corpse.

Even now, Aexilica wasn't so far off. She felt the mystical power of Emma's potion broiling away inside her, reknitting her body from the core out and undoing the damage. It was slow, so slow. Long and plodding minutes stretched by as she forced herself to stand and waited to finish reversing what Groygar had done with a single strike.

It didn't, not fully. Aexilica's ribs still ached as she started moving, magical metal dented and buckled where his blow had impacted. The potion wouldn't heal that, damn it. She advanced, thundering back through the ravine and following the path of her own flight.

Aexilica was shaken by how far she had to move. Hundreds of yards, hundreds. A damned arrow might not have crossed so long a path, and she'd been flung fast enough to only stop upon impact with the wall. That impact's legacy still clung painfully to her side.

And here I am running back to keep fighting the man who mustered it.

Her blood didn't run cold, the thrill of combat was too intense for that. Aexilica didn't even feel sick, her stomach had gone completely numb. She just moved, mechanically and mindlessly. And probably to her death.

Emma had been fighting hard, Aexilica got her first hint of that fact when she caught sight of the steam rising high into the air. Steam and dust, and as she approached she was entirely unsurprised to see the ground pitted and cratered where some of her "energy lances" had clearly impacted the stone. It was more than a little bit frightening, how accustomed she was getting to that girl's destructive power.

I'm an example of that, now.

Aexilica looked at the edge of her magic weapon. Tempting to attribute everything she'd managed today to that arcane edge, but she knew it wasn't true. Her muscles were moving with more force and speed than she could ever have managed herself, and it was just another example of Emma's growing magic.

But still not enough, not for this fight.

And yet you're running into it, anyway?

Aexilica didn't even understand that herself, but she didn't have time to understand anything now. She'd arrived.

Emma was on the ground, Groygar was standing beside her. Both of them were turned to face the same direction, and Aexilica saw why as she followed their eyes.

Vari. Vari was standing there, holding the painting, staring the Demigod down and shouting things so frantically and incoherently that Aexilica couldn't even tell what he was attempting to say. She could tell what he was attempting to do though, that much was clear as day.

Evidently, the Demigod could tell too. Aexilica saw fear in his body, with how the great musculature of his back and shoulders was knotting in and quivering. He'd never looked like that when facing injury or death, it seemed imprisonment was another matter altogether.

***

If Emma concentrated any harder, she was going to end up crowbarring her brain right out of its skull. On the other hand, if she concentrated any softer, Groygar was going to overcome the magic of the painting, turn around and take care of that for her anyway. So this was his fault for not giving her any better options.

Her head hurt. Emma ignored it.

Focus when the painting is brought out, attach your will to it. It can't hurt. She fucking hated Larry. He was tight-lipped about everything, but full of explanations when giving them meant Emma would have more work and bullshit to put up with. As soon as she was done with this she was going to find the biggest cliff she could and drop the horrible fucking thing off its edge.

The theory was—or had been—that there was something innate in the painting itself which had trapped Groygar, and that the release mechanism Milton the Moron had pulled on was part of a secondary enchantment set up by whoever had wanted him released at some point. Emma wasn't sure where Larry was getting that, because the bastard wasn't telling, but if he was right, it ought to have meant that the painting's power was still active and just waiting for a source of energy to let it ensnare Groygar again.

Enter Emma, an Untethered. Untrained, unskilled, essentially a babbling toddler among the world of reality-warping. But, nonetheless, a giant, humming cosmic battery. She'd clumsily wrapped her mind around the painting when it became clear that Vari wouldn't be winning them the fight even if he did enter it with two hands free. One gamble, after another, after another. In a just world any one of the risks would have spectacularly failed to pay off and then gotten Emma pathetically, avoidably killed.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

But she'd learned long ago that this was not a just world, and sure enough every single one of the risks paid off. The painting activated, weird tendrils of magic ensnared Groygar, and Emma felt her mana start getting dragged out with all the suction of her own mouth that one time she'd tried coke.

Which did not mean things were over, because Groygar had done the very thing Emma had been so desperately hoping he wouldn't. He'd resisted. Something about Demigods seemed just innately anti-magical, or perhaps magical enough that magic which wasn't their own just failed to work. His flesh was resistant to being weakened by her Matter effects, and apparently he was now holding his own in an arcane tug-of-war.

More than holding his own, maybe. Maybe less. It was too early to tell. Emma kept the Demigod locked in her thoughts and just focused on dragging him towards the painting, feeling the power flow from her, into the frame, out of it and wrap around Groygar to fall back into the painting. The air tasted of ozone, like it was being supercharged by the sheer magic on display. And Groygar was moving. Slowly.

Inching towards the painting, surrendering to its pull. Emma found a grin spreading across her face. Maybe she wasn't a match for any Demigod yet, but with an artefact like that upping her power it would go far enough to—holy fuck what was that drooling moron doing?

Astrid charged at Groygar, somehow wielding a dagger. A magic dagger, ornate and new, rather than old, and humming with power as she sprinted glacially towards the Demgiod. He was so distracted by the painting's pull that he somehow kept his eyes off her for the entire relative minute she needed to close the distance.

Her knife came down hard as she screamed.

"NO! I'll see you dead, not locked away with magic!" To Emma's amazement, the knife actually dug into Groygar's skin. To her unamazement, it basically just scratched it. Didn't even draw blood. Then the Demigod was turning.

Emma didn't quite see him bat Astrid away, but she did see how violently the girl was thrown back despite the obvious laziness with which Groygar's arm extended. She landed a dozen metres back, twitching and convulsing. There was a dent in her chest. Even Emma felt sick seeing it.

But not sick enough to take her mind off the pulling contest, not nearly. She redoubled her will, let out a scream. Verbal, physical. The use of her lungs and throat adding an animalistic weight to the exertion of thought, maybe making a difference and maybe not, but serving as an outlet for her effort in either case.

Groygar screamed too, apparently nearing his own limits. For a few seconds that was just the world, two screaming lunatics. One a man who called himself a Demigod, the other a woman who'd unironically practiced solipsism. But there could only ever have been one winner.

And it was Emma.

The Demigod's feet left the ground, his limbs thrashing around through the air as he was dragged across the ravine screaming and swearing. Emma laughed, even as he smashed into the painting and was engulfed by an opening flower of light. It actually made her eyes sting. But not enough to look away.

"Ha! Yes! Fuck you!" Emma laughed, cheered, would have gotten up to dance if her aching body could yet manage it. She stared and basked in the sight of Groygar's struggles even as they slowly got weaker and slower, limbs snagged and overpowered by the light as if it were fluid instead of pure energy. Like a normal man drowning. Groygar disappeared into the light after a moment, and then even that dissolved back into the painting. Emma watched the surface ripple, paint seeming to liquefy all over and run along the canvas like waves on an ocean's surface. For a few awful moments she felt certain the Demigod would emerge all over.

Then the paint settled, and she let out a sigh of relief.

***

Aexilica would've been lying if she'd claimed not to be relieved that Groygar was already sealed away before she could be dragged into fighting him. And she'd have been lying if she claimed, regardless of Astrid's body lying just a few dozen paces from her, that her relief wasn't stronger still than the grief.

Emma's, surprisingly, did not seem to be. She forced herself clumsily to her feet and stumbled more than ran over to Astrid, falling down just short of her. By now her armour was gone, disintegrating and falling off her body as she released it. She crawled the last few feet, tears actually welling in her eyes.

"No." Emma groaned, kneeling up beside Astrid and staring down at her. "Astrid no, don't leave me!"

Aexilica closed in as Emma's trembling sobs grew worse, hearing the younger girl's voice now. It was so quiet, so fragile.

"It's okay." She whispered. "I'm…I'm going to be with him…"

"The money!" Emma snapped. "You need to tell me where the money is before you die!"

Aexilica felt the fucking guts fall out of her. That was what she was crying about? No, of course it was.

"Kallvindr." Astrid continued, not seeming to even hear Emma. Her breaths were rattly, jagged things. Aexilica saw blood crusting at the corners of her mouth, and the woman's eyes were glassy. It was the look of a dying person, Aexilica had seen it enough times before to be well familiar with it.

"Shut up!" Emma screamed. "Shut up! Shut the fuck up! I'll kill you! Where is your money?!"

Astrid just smiled.

"When we first met? Oh, so long ago now. Weeks, surely, maybe more. Gods, he was so magnificent even then…"

"I DON'T CARE! AAAAAH! FUCK, I DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR STUPID FUCKING DRAGON, GIVE ME YOUR MONEY YOU STUPID BITCH!" Emma was screaming, sobbing. Aexilica saw snot bubbling from her nose and running down her face in ugly welts. It was almost like seeing an infant's wailing.

Slowly, Astrid's breathing died down. Aexilica felt like vomiting. She'd seen people die of course, made them die, but this was far too peaceful. There was nothing to focus on now, no defense to raise against other attacks. Just a girl dying and nothing she could do to stop it. If Emma had her potion, or Vari's, she'd have used them already. And there was no time to make more.

"I just…" Emma sobbed, swore, sobbed some more. "...I just don't want to be fucking poor anymore." She had, Aexilica realised, actually pissed herself.

Astrid died soon after.

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