Astra seemed almost to disappear as she was struck. Her body shot back like the bullet of a sling, visible to Xeno’s eye only long enough that she could see the girl spinning head over heels as she flew. Then she tore through the canopy.

Wherever she flew after that was obscured behind a ceiling of strangling vines and grasping branches.

The moment she lost sight of her friend, Xeno turned back to the beast she’d been fighting- heart nearly stopping with icy terror as she saw it charging towards her.

She fumbled with her magic, cursing as the energies spilled out from between her fingers while she readied a new projectile. The orc was closing fast, however, and her clumsy digits grew less coordinated by the moment. As if each of the creature’s steps were leaching dexterity from them.

By the time it was two thirds to her, Xeno realised she wouldn’t have her attack ready. She numbly registered that her magic would fail to save her even if it were ready and perfected, yet the simple act of wasting her efforts- let alone placidly standing and doing nothing while she waited for her fate- was beyond her.

As the orc came to within only a handful of paces, something streaked past Xeno’s head. The projectile struck the orc in the shoulder, letting out a deep crack as it bounced free.

For a long, hopeful moment she wondered if the impact had broken one of the beast’s bones, but when her eyes focused on the remnants of the missile, she saw that it- a jagged grey stone just a hair smaller than her head- had split down the middle and was falling away in thrice as many pieces as it had flown in.

The orc’s footing faltered, its sprint turning into a stumble, and before Xeno could even think to capitalise on the opening, something else flew past her. Far bigger than the first.

Fisher of team Triland charged like a bull and crashed like a cannonball. The orc, already off-balance, was sent staggering as the boy hit it, and the Northerner didn’t wait a second before beginning his assault.

His punches were like a mass of birds flying in formation, swifter than the wind itself and seeming to come from all directions. They ducked, dived, swooped and banked. Landing wherever the orc’s defences happened to be open, and then snapping back to change targets long before it could adjust.

So intrepid and violent was the barrage that Xeno forgot herself entirely, only hurriedly going back to forming another construct after the boy had already thrown enough strikes to knock down a tree.

The orc was no tree, though, and just as its resilience far surpassed any of the towering evergreens surrounding them, so too did its animacy.

As one of Fisher’s blows fell upon the creature’s face, it darted out a hand to grab him. For all his strength and toughness, the Northerner wasn’t quite so fast as Astra, and before he could pull his fist out of harm’s reach, the beast’s grip tightened around his wrist.

With an almighty tug it dragged him off-balance, burying grey knuckles into his gut before he could right himself.

Xeno glimpsed the boy’s mouth open as spittle fell from it, eyes wide with shock and pain. And then her view was obscured as the orc brought its hand down on the back of his head, releasing its grip at the same time and driving him face-first into the dirt. He sank up to the ears.

Her mind was a blur, her hands ablaze with motion. Before Xeno had fully processed what was happening, another blue disk had leapt from her grip and sailed across the forest.

It shattered like porcelain against the monster’s fortress-thick musculature, leaving only blue dust clinging to its back.

Thoughts are like energy. Thoughts are like energy.

If Xeno’s thoughts were energy, they’d have been a cloud of black powder. Erratic, volatile, slipping from her fingers even as she tried to grasp them. What was wrong with her?

The orc rushed towards her again, but this time Xeno was ready. She threw her hands forwards, letting loose another disk- but aimed far more carefully than the others. Just as the orc’s foot came down to power it forwards, her attack struck it in the lower shin.

Its leg flew back, slipping free of the dirt in a spray of soil and torn plant fibre, and the savage toppled forwards.

Xeno grinned at the sight of the creature’s head smashing into a jutting root, chipping a brow-shaped chunk from the hardened wood and coming to a grinding stop as its body strained against the rest of the tree’s coiling limbs.

Eager to use her breathing room well, Xeno emptied out more of her magic reserve into her hands- feeling a stab of apprehension at their emptiness compared to the beginning of the task- and began solidifying it.

Rather than produce more projectiles, she waited and let the mass build for a few moments. Her arms began to shake from the weight of it, yet still she held on- taking a few moments more to add to her construct before letting it loose.

The strip of blue leapt from her hands, pooling for a moment before arching over the ground and cascading onto the prone orc.

It was almost like a sapphire sunset, seeming to drag in all light around it and cast the forest in shades of cyan and cobalt. Xeno poured yet more magic into the construct, letting it thicken and widen, layering more and more on top of it until it had become nearly so thick as a man was tall.

Luminox had mass, though not a lot. In such amounts as that, however, even with its meagre density- somewhere between water and oil- the material could accrue a great weight indeed. Not even the orc could dislodge such a construct easily.

Xeno dropped to one knee, head suddenly light, ears suddenly ringing. As she waited for the infernal dizziness to pass her over, she carefully prodded that special place in her core that held her magic reserves.

Half empty, or half full. She wasn’t feeling particularly optimistic.

Shooting another glance at the blue sheet she’d layered over the creature brought a bitter sneer to her lips, only for it to die as she coughed- heaving acidic spit from her mouth and throat, yet just managing to keep her food down.

That was a lot of luminox she’d conjured, yet for such a steep price it was pitiful. She’d wasted three quarters of the magic that had gone into it, and drained so much of her reserves in so little time that it was like losing a litre of blood.

Her thoughts fizzled in her head, the hot fouling of detonated gunpowder.

So disordered and enfeebled were they, that through the blurry haze before her vision, she thought she saw the strip of luminox begin to move. An impossibility, and one clearly born from her own irrational fear.

Xeno shook her head lightly, blinking to focus her eyes before looking back. When she saw the luminox shifting further, it was as though a great hand had reached through her flesh and manually squeezed the air from her lungs.

In her panic she turned to run, only to trip over her own feet and hit the ground. She scrambled two paces before realising it was best to get up, and as she scrambled to her feet it was too much to resist glancing over her shoulder.

The luminox had been lifted a cubit from where it fell, and the orc’s fingertips visibly curled around the side. An iron hold bearing an untellable weight.

As she went to begin her flight, a maddened idea entered Xeno’s head. A supid idea, nigh-suicidal. Yet one which just might bring her victory.

She turned, hurriedly sprinting back in the direction of the orc as fast as her tiny, weak legs could carry her. Just as she came to the base of the luminox sheet, she leapt.

Her body soared seven feet high, coming down less than a pace from the edge of the blue construct. Xeno let herself drop to her knees, then flattened her body down even further- pressing her chest against the top of the material.

Closing her eyes, against her every instinct, and concentrating, Xeno felt her will seep into the very structure of the luminox- her mind seeping into the space between its molecules like water soaking into a rag. As she permeated it deeper, she became acutely aware of the thousand million little bonds holding it in place.

She tugged on them, ripping them apart like strands in a bed cover and leaving the construct to fall apart- shearing five feet from its top layers.

With the weight suddenly reduced by three quarters, the orc’s straining muscles proved enough to launch it back. Xeno felt the air tremble as the sheet hurtled back, nearly clipping her as it flipped over before crashing against something out of sight.

Suddenly, there was nothing between her and the orc but air. It stared at her, surprise slowing its already sluggish thoughts and robbing it of action. Xeno grinned despite herself as gravity hurled her at the beast, reaching out for its forehead for the crystal.

Two of her fingernails squeezed themselves under the prize, her knees crashing into the boulder-like chest and sending numbing jolts up into her stomach.

She grit her teeth, determined not to relax her hold, and began to work her other digits around and underneath the emerald stone. Just when she’d nearly managed to make her ring finger join the first two, the orc overcame its surprise and moved.

Xeno yelped, kicking off and pulling her hand free. She felt a great pain at the end of it, and then the world began flipping over itself.

Her stomach became a sloshing mess, threatening to bring her bread and water breakfast back up, and when she finally hit the ground it was so sudden she took a second to even notice.

She rolled for a foot, then her shoulder struck something hard and flipped her over. Knives of agony raked down her arm as she came to a sliding stop, but even through the pained haze she forced her gaze onto her fingers.

They held no crystal, and a single glance revealed the source of the pain she’d felt upon pulling them back. Two of the nails had been torn free, jutting away from the skin at unnatural angles.

Before her mangled digits could wash her with pain anew, Xeno forced herself to stand. Her weakened limbs made the effort slow.

Too slow.

Shifting dirt and rustling leaves was the only warning she got, facing away from the orc as she was. Even as she leapt forwards, the blow that fell across her shoulder blades still served to drive the wind from her and send her head over heels once more.

She came to a stop upside-down against a tree, her head resting on the dirt, hair spilling around it and feet limply dangling above her.

In her inverted vision she saw the orc hurrying forwards once more, eyes eager to spill blood and lips thirsty to drink it. Ten paces, nearing fast. Xeno leaned to one side, dropping to her hands and knees and straightening to a stand.

By the time her feet were flat on the ground, the monster was barely a few yards from her. It was luck, not skill, that let her duck it's fist.

Knuckles reduced bark to splinters, and the wood beneath to mush. Xeno brought her hands together, gathering luminox even as her foe began to turn. She released a blue disk just in time, placing it between the orc’s eyes the moment they found her again.

At point blank range, it seemed even her attacks could stun the creature. The orc grunted, snorting and bringing a clumsy hand up to its face.

She didn’t waste time in backing off, nor preparing a new disk.

Just as she was prepared to attack the orc once more, Xeno saw it disappear amidst a great mass of fire.

The forest hissed, twigs and branches rupturing as trapped water tore itself free. In seconds the entire area was a swirling mass of steam, smoke and embers- burning leaves dancing in the atmospheric currents, fire running along creepers and making them burning whips as they hung lazily.

All the while, the orc was clear amidst the heart of the conflagration. Its roar was unlike a man’s, but so too was it different from an animal. Somehow both, and neither.

A grotesquery made from human intelligence and bestial wildness. Continuing so long Xeno wondered about its lung capacity.

With a start, she realised that pain would leave the orc paralysed for only so long. She hurriedly backed away, leaving her hands together and magic thickening all the while. As she watched, she noticed a streak of flame running off from the main inferno.

Following it led her eyes to Ajoke Balogun, peering out from between two trees, hands outstretched and entire body knotted. The grimace twisting her face belied just how much effort she was putting behind the fire.

The budding blisters marking Xeno served as testament enough to its effects, even paces from the worst of the blaze.

Almost too quickly for Xeno to follow, the orc began to stiffen. The mad flailing that had seized the beast’s body was stifled, replaced by a far more controlled motion. It took only seconds of looking around before its head was pointed at Ajoke, and it charged without hesitation.

Her hands parted, her disk flew, and the monster didn’t even seem to register the impact as it tore for Balogun.

The flames quickly fizzled out as it neared her, whether broken by panic or exhaustion Xeno couldn’t tell.

As the orc swung a great arm around, bowling the girl over and casting her flat against the ground, all thoughts left her mind. Replaced by frustration, rage and disgust at her own weakness.

If thoughts were like energy, then surely Xeno was burned fuel. It was a blunt mind indeed which failed to control even itself, as Father would say.

Father, who’d taught her the value of her mind above all else. Father, who’d ensured she had knowledge in place of joy. Father who’d spent her whole life a tyrant, controlling every facet of her existence only to be surprised when she struggled to control herself.

Father, who the Unixian Alliance had freed her from.

Xeno felt a thrum of power, flaring up so quickly that she almost missed it- yet unmistakable. It was gone fast, but not so fast that she didn’t realise the cause. Anger, of course. Perfect for seizing hold of her magic and giving it direction, yet anathema to any delicate weaving of the power.

It seemed no matter which shape she changed her thoughts into, they always wanted for something. Calm for control, yet at the cost of strength. Panic for speed, yet at the cost of stability.

And then it struck her.

Limiting oneself to a single strategy was a guarantee of failure, why would magic be the single exception?

Gripping her mind as if to wield it like a weapon, pushing all unnecessary sensations from herself, Xeno concentrated like she never had before.

Anger, fear, apathy, she oscillated between them all in equal measure. Switching between them as though she were a workman selecting his tools. She couldn’t force herself to feel, but she could focus on what was already there. And there was no cocktail of emotion quite like the heat of battle.

Grinning with triumph, exhilaration and vindication, she formed her magic into luminox.

***

Ajoke had almost kept the stream of fire going. Almost ignored her training in favour of the instinctive urge to attack that gripped her.

It might have meant defeat, if she’d given in. Defeat, or death.

Instead, she let up her flames just before the orc reached her. Its sight cleared, its eyes focused, and it lunged based on sight. Ajoke stepped back; guarding the strike, letting it throw her down, and raised her legs against the monster’s trunk.

She heaved, barely holding it back as it hunched over her- kneeling and raising its arms to pummel her.

Just as it began to move, she shot another jet of fire into its face. The tongue of flame wrapped around the monster’s head in an instant, obscuring its skin- which had already been covered with ugly burns- and cooking it once more.

In an instant, the orc’s eyes were blinded by light. Its nose filled with the scent of its own charring flesh, ears overwhelmed by the crackling blaze. Ajoke adjusted her position and straightened her legs, sending herself sliding free from under it just in time for the descending fist to miss her.

She couldn’t help but grin as the ground shook slightly under the force of the wild attack, then got to her feet and charged. Just as the fires around the orc’s head died, she leapt.

Her knee crunched into its nose, bringing her body to a jerking stop and snapping the beast’s head back. It began to topple, legs shaking as it tried to regain its balance, yet arms swiping for Ajoke at the same time.

She easily evaded the clumsy attack and responded with another wall of fire.

The orc screamed as heat ate its flesh, charging forwards and forcing Ajoke to release the blaze lest she burn herself. Disoriented, the orc’s clawing and punching arms were almost trivial to evade.

Ajoke hopped back, and the orc rampaged forwards.

Her attention was kept partially behind her, aware that tripping on a root was near as much a threat as the flurry of attacks heading her way.

Tears swelled in the orc’s eyes, surprising Ajoke more with their existence than volume. Something about seeing such a reaction from the monster was comforting. It chipped away at the vision of an invincible monster, bolstering her confidence and steadying her hand.

A swing came particularly close to catching her, and Ajoke felt the orc’s skin graze her cheek as she leaned back. Before it could follow up, she raised a hand once more and wreathed it in another lash of fire.

When she went to leap back, however, the orc surprised her. As if it didn’t even feel the touch of the blaze, it brought a scarred hand round for her- too fast and sudden to dodge.

She cried out as chipped nails ripped through the fabric of her clothes, biting deep into the flesh beneath. As she was sent flying, she felt hot pain and wet numbness spreading through her side in equal measure.

A root caught Ajoke just before she hit the dirt, flipping her over and halving her momentum. She rolled and slid for three heartbeats longer before coming to a stop, lying on her side and gasping for breath that had long since escaped her.

Through blurred vision, she saw the orc approach. It almost made her weep to realise that there was nothing she could do before it reached her.

And then, just as the tower of singed grey flesh and coiling dense muscle reared up to deliver the finishing blow, something crunched into its side. Ajoke could see little through the fog in her eyes, save for a blue streak, and the orc’s mass flipping entirely over as it was torn from the ground.

***

Xeno watched as her construct impacted the orc. An ellipsoid of pure luminox, cobalt blue and as opaque as coal, it was a foot wide and a yard long.

It was the obvious choice. A high volume compared to the area that would meet the air, reducing drag, and carefully made in such a way that the luminox’s grains would bear the stress lengthways- where they were strongest.

She had realised the practicality of such a design from the beginning of the fight, and in hindsight she realised that it would have been simple to make- even with only a fraction of her magic- had she simply taken her time.

Fear had compelled her to waste power on smaller, ineffectual creations. But fear held no sway over her now. It was an external thing, an oddity to be remarked upon where it appeared in others and, when necessary, used as a tool.

She had used it to fuel the propelling force of her latest missile, and watched as it met its mark.

The orc was blown back, caught directly in the ribs, and stopped only when it’s lumbering bulk had ripped through a dozen yards of undergrowth. Xeno eyed the creature while it stood, taking note of all relevant details.

It was furious, a brutal rictus seizing its face. Yet rather than barrel forwards as it had before, it remained in place. She deduced, by the way it stooped about the side she’d struck, that her attack had hurt the beast substantially.

Ugly welts were clear across the entirety of its body, inches wide and rimmed with the black of charred meat. She doubted they were much deeper than the skin, but such wounds were far from superficial.

More cautiously before, the orc began to approach.

It was almost comical to see its fear and weariness so clearly displayed, the way it toed the ground before stepping, sniffed as though she may have concealed a trap in the air itself.

Xeno noted that it responded to genuine danger far more differently than the last one had. Did orcs vary between individuals, causing wild differences in how they’d handle similar situations? Perhaps she was just a bigger threat than Amelia.

She made a mental note to find out which hypothesis was correct, later though. For now she had work to do.

Raising a hand, she flexed each finger in sequence, starting with the thumb. Luminox slipped free of the digits, solidifying and hardening as she willed it. Within moments there was another cylindrical projectile, hovering centimetres from her outstretched palm.

The orc seemed to recognise the construct, but not quickly enough to do anything before Xeno launched it.

It struck in the centre of the chest, where ribs met and lungs heaved. Luminox strained against bone, driving the orc back a full fathom and folding it over with the impact. Somehow, the creature seemed smaller all of a sudden.

Xeno dismissed the notion. It hadn’t shrunk, that she thought it had showed only that her perception was still- primitively- warped by her emotions. That wouldn’t do at all.

With a howl that cast every scrap of its exertion, pain and confusion across the entire stage, the orc straightened up. It began to advance again, faster this time. Had her attack banished its shock, or was it simply too stupid to know any response besides an offensive?

She wasted no more time on questions.

With a flick of her wrists, the ground before her became a garden of luminox tendrils- coiling around one another, tangled together inseparably like a bird’s nest. None extended any higher than her shoulder, or the orc’s waist, but they didn’t need to.

Xeno had made the tendrils differently than most of her constructs. Each was a mass of extremely small strips, formed in and around one another by the million. Their very slight flexibility was exaggerated by such a structure, rendering the luminox far springier than normal.

She noted that it worked exactly as intended. The orc had surely expected to stride over the material, yet as it stepped on top of the sapphire growths, they simply yielded under its weight.

In an instant the beast had fallen on top of them, and before it could even begin to rise Xeno smothered it with yet more strangling luminox.

The vines and creepers of the emerald forest above found their mirror in the floor, and that mirror proved far more of a match for the orc’s strength. The beast screamed and thrashed, pulling the bars of its cerulean prison taut.

Muscles flexed, skin tightened and veins bulged, yet the great organic machinery of the predator’s body could do no more than make the luminox quiver.

Force enough to strain it, to test it. Not to break it.

Moving slowly, seeing no need to hurry, Xeno approached the trapped animal.

It occurred to her that mere minutes ago, the sounds of its furious, desperate cries may well have sent her running in a panic. Now they served only to inform her of the orc’s fear.

She became aware of many things as her steps brought her nearer to the squirming behemoth. Chief among them was the rising form of Ajoke Balogun; hand pressed against a tree to support herself, hair disheveled, chest heaving.

Xeno hurried her gait, reaching the struggling orc moments later and wasting no time in leaning down to grab the crystal from its head.

The flash of fire in the corner of her vision may well have come as a surprise, had it come just a few minutes ago. When the mechanisms of her mind were still filled with trust and fear, irrationalities acting like grit between the gears of her thoughts.

A wall of luminox devoured the flames, though Xeno still felt the heat from the other side.

Before the fire could build, eat away at her construct and envelope her like it had the orc, she closed her fingers around the crystal- carefully keeping them from the orc’s gnashing jaws- and gently tugged it free.

Instantly, the creature’s struggling stopped. A glazed look washed over its eyes, shoulders relaxed, fists uncurled, eyes untightened. Xeno didn’t need to figure out why.

From her fingers, more specifically the exact sections physically touching the crystal, she could feel a great magical presence. Her own power was considerable, she was objective enough now to acknowledge that, but it was like a candle next to the bonfire in her hand.

Manamis, the power of thoughts. The power of the orc’s thoughts, or rather the power over them.

Xeno dimly imagined the orc sitting up, and wasn’t remotely surprised to see the creature straining in such a way that, were it not for her own trap, it would have done so.

A crack came from the side of her, and she turned to see her luminox wall beginning to break down under the assault of Balogun’s fire. She was more powerful than the girl now, by far. But her reserves had been exhausted, and she would need only to take the crystal from her to win.

Her safest option was clear.

With one lash of her mind, Xeno set the luminox pinning her orc to crumble. With another, she gave the great monster orders. Attack Ajoke Balogun, disable her as a threat. The creature began to rise, feral rage and brutality returning to its blank face yet tempered by the cold logic of Xeno’s own command, when the world started to desaturate.

The last thing Xeno saw was the forest’s vibrant greens, rich browns and deep greys bleeding from it. Followed by the very space around her seeming to warp and collapse in on itself.