Even as Anne desperately prayed, she had no real hope of being rescued.

After all, no one had ever come to her rescue before. In her previous life, after her family cut ties with her, Anne had had no choice but to find her own way in the world.

She hadn’t had the cash to pay for college, so she’d worked a series of shitty retail jobs until she could get a series of shitty office jobs, all so that she could afford to live in a shitty apartment and eat shitty frozen meals every day.

And although Anne had been on friendly terms with most people she knew, she had never quite managed to find a community for herself. She’d had plenty of acquaintances, but at the end of the day she went home alone.

Once, when Anne was 21, she’d woken up in the middle of the night with a horrible sharp, jabbing pain in her abdomen. The agony was so awful that she didn’t even want to move, but there was no one she could call, and she couldn’t afford an ambulance. So she’d crawled out of bed and driven herself to the hospital.

It was appendicitis. After the surgery, when the drugs made it unsafe for her to drive, she’d had to take an Uber home.

Her whole life, no one was ever there for her. Not her family. Not her coworkers. Certainly not God. Why should a Goddess be any different?

But at least in this new life, Anne had been able to experience the love she’d missed out on in her old life. She had a brother she was close to. She had friends. She had Corvina.

It was highly likely that there was no way out of this. There was no way Anne could save herself, and no one was coming to the rescue. How could they? Eva had turned out to be an insanely overpowered magician, and no one even knew where Anne was right now. But even if her stay in this world had been short, Anne was truly grateful for the time she’d been able to spend as the Saintess of Coris.

Anne braced herself for death.

But to her surprise, instead of searing pain as a knife pierced through her heart, there was a loud thud followed by a crash and the sound of various falling objects and shattering glass.

Anne opened her eyes. Eva was gone.

Anne sort of squirmed around until she could see the other side of the room.

Eva was lying on the ground next to an overturned table, surrounded by the remnants of her alchemical experiments. It was a miracle nothing had exploded. The assassin, the Unseen Rain was standing above her.

The light was already fading from the magic circle.

Leaving Eva where she was, the assassin leapt back the other way, directly over top of Anne, and brought their blade down through the heart of the spirit of the Saintess, still standing in the same place, where she had been trying to strangle Eva.

The blade went right through her incorporeal form.

The Saintess looked down at her unwounded chest, a stunned expression on her face, and then she looked up and met Anne’s eyes. And then she disappeared.

“Shit,” muttered Rain.

“You!” Eva dragged herself up from the floor. Blood was dripping down her face, and shadow tendrils were gathering behind her. “What are you doing here?”

Rain shrugged. “I sort of thought I might have a chance at completing my contract after all. But it seems you can’t kill a ghost.”

“So you’re still after my Saintess, then,” said Eva. She began to stalk forwards, shadows gathering in the shape of a blade around her hand. “In that case, let me continue my work and come back tomorrow. That way you can try to kill her again, and I can really take my time savoring the moment as I kill you.”

“Well…” Rain looked down at Anne, who was looking up at them pleadingly. “I kind of figured the whole contract thing was a long shot. But I actually kind of like this Saintess. And overall I decided I would prefer it if she wasn’t dead. So I also came to save her life.”

Anne felt a huge wave of relief and gratitude wash over her.

“If you save her, you guarantee that you’ll never be able to fulfill your contract,” said Eva.

“Eh.” Rain shrugged again. “I don’t really care.”

“Fine,” said Eva. “I’ll kill you quickly, then.”

Eva launched herself at Rain so fast that she must have been using magic, but Rain easily blocked the attack. Anne kind of lost track of the battle after that, but they seemed evenly matched, pushing each other around the room, neither of them letting the other control the space.

There were more crashing and shattering sounds as they fought, making a further mess out of the already cluttered room. Anne began to worry that she might end up dead after all, killed by a piece of falling debris or some sort of alchemical accident.

“Anne!”

Anne looked over to the stairs and saw Corvina there, looking resplendent in trousers and glasses, with her hair tied up, holding a sword.

A second wave of relief and gratitude washed over Anne, this one so strong that it cleared out all of her remaining fears and worries. The only thought Anne had left in her brain was how incredibly beautiful Corvina looked in that outfit.

Corvina quickly ran over to her, dropping her sword and pulling a dagger from her boot. The same dagger Anne had used to cut her own hair at the ball. That felt so long ago now. But at the same time it seemed like just yesterday.

Corvina cut the ropes that were binding Anne and removed the gag from around her mouth.

Anne immediately grabbed Corvina around the neck and dragged her into a kiss.

Corvina put a hand on Anne’s chest and gently pushed her away. “Later,” she said, gently. “We have to get you out of here. Are you hurt at all?”

“You came to save me,” said Anne. Her mind was still struggling to catch up to this incredible turn of events. “You and the assassin. You actually came to save me.”

“Yes, well…” said Corvina. “I’ve read enough romance novels to know that that’s what you’re supposed to do, isn’t it? Rescue the damsel in distress?”

“I’m not really the kind of damsel most people would bother saving…” said Anne.

Their faces were still so close together that it was hard for Anne to read Corvina’s expression, but she could hear Corvina’s breath catch in her throat. “You’re someone worth saving,” she said, and there was something intense and difficult to read in her tone. Something like pity, or compassion, or fierce anger at the world for ever having made Anne believe otherwise. “When I thought I might have lost you forever, I—”

A glass vial full of a mysterious liquid flew over Corvina’s head, barely missing her, and smashed into the ground a few feet away. A noxious gas began rising from the resulting puddle, causing both Anne and Corvina to start coughing.

“We’ll talk later,” Corvina choked out, grasping her sword again. “Let’s go.”

Corvina held her hand out to Anne and Anne took it. Together, they stood up and made a break for the stairs.

But just before they could reach the bottom step, Eva appeared out of nowhere in front of them, blocking the way.

Blood was still dripping down her face, but now she was hunched over, clutching a new wound in her side. She was breathing heavily, with dark smoke escaping from her mouth with every exhale.

“Sorry, but I can’t lose this opportunity,” said Eva.

Corvina struck out with her sword, but some unseen force knocked it out of her hand, sending it skittering across the floor, out of reach.

Rain was lying in a crumpled pile next to where the sword landed. Whether they were dead or just knocked out, Anne couldn’t tell.

“It’s riskier to attempt this outside of the circle,” said Eva, her voice raspy, “But it’s not impossible. I just need to capture your mana. If I do that, I can figure out the rest later. So just… die already!”

Once again, Eva raised her knife, and Corvina threw herself in front of Anne, clearly intending to take the blow for her.

But once again, the blow never came. Instead, Eva screamed and dropped her weapon.

An arrow was sticking out of the back of her shoulder.

“Agis came, too?” asked Anne, once again amazed at the thought of people caring about her so much that they’d bother tracking down a secret lab and fighting a powerful dark wizard for her.

But Corvina didn’t waste any time responding. She grabbed Anne’s arm to drag her past Eva and up the stairs before the cleric had time to recover and block them again. Agis was waiting for them partway up the steps, a new arrow already prepared, ready to go if Eva attacked again.

Anne was about to greet him warmly when she saw his furrowed brows and suddenly remembered that Agis and Eva had known each other since childhood.

They never fight each other in the original novel, thought Anne. This is all my fault. I’m the reason Agis just had to shoot one of his oldest friends.

“Why are you doing this, Eva?” asked Agis, calling down the stairs. “This isn’t like you. I know you can be scary sometimes, but you always have a good reason for doing anything that you do… And you’d never really hurt anyone. Not anyone good, anyway. Not without cause. Definitely not Anne. So what happened? This strange power… are you losing control of it? Is someone forcing you to do all this? Eva, please talk to me. If you just tell us what’s happening, maybe we can help you. Maybe no one needs to get hurt anymore.”

Corvina put a hand on the elf prince’s shoulder. “There’s no point trying to reason with her. I’ll explain everything to you later, but right now we need to get out of here.”

Corvina hasn’t told him, Anne realized, with dawning horror. I never told him. He still doesn’t know.

“Please, Eva,” called Agis, taking another step back up the stairs but refusing to retreat.

Eva laughed, a bitter chuckle evolving into a fit of frantic giggling. She reached back and grabbed the arrow still inside her. There was a flash of darkness and the arrow disintegrated.

“You don’t even know, do you?” said Eva, a crazed look in her eye. “They never told you.”

“Don’t listen to her, Agis,” Corvina hissed, tugging on his arm. “She’ll just try to confuse you, twist things to fit her own narrative. I told you I’ll explain later, but only when we have time to properly talk it out.”

“Right, okay…” said Agis, taking another step back, watching Eva with an expression of fear and concern, but also deep compassion.

Anne felt sick to her stomach.

“She’s not your sister, you know!” shouted Eva. The words landed in Anne’s ears like physical blows.

She’s not your sister…

“She’s an impostor from another world!” continued Eva. “She killed your sister and took over her body! But I can bring her back! I can bring our Anne back to us!”

“What?!” said Agis, “Okay, so you really have lost your marbles. That’s completely insane, that’s—” Agis finally looked away from Eva and saw the expressions on Anne’s face. “That’s… impossible, isn’t it?”

“Think about it,” said Eva. Her gentle smile and calming vocal tone had returned, although both seemed a lot more sinister with blood still running down her face. “What do you think seems more likely? That I would deliberately try to harm Anne, our Anne, or that I would do anything to get your sister back from a monster who had stolen her from us?”

Agis shook his head, brows knit even further in confusion and distress.

The last few days had been a rollercoaster of emotion, and the last few minutes even more so. Anne simply couldn’t hold it all in anymore. Tears were streaming down her face.

“I’m so sorry, Agis,” she said, her voice cracking. “I didn’t come to this world on purpose. You sister… she chose to bring me here.”

““You don’t have to defend yourself,” snapped Corvina. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”

“You’re betraying your own sister!” shouted Eva. Somehow she had picked up her knife again and was slowly climbing the first few steps. “For the sake of some… nobody. Did you ever even love Anne at all?”

“Your sister just wanted to… go somewhere else,” Anne continued, still trying to explain despite everything. She just wanted Agis to understand. “I’ve been trying to help her, although I don’t always understand what she’s trying to tell me. She—”

Eva launched herself up the stairs, but Agis reacted quickly despite his shocked state, loosing another arrow directly into Eva’s leg, knocking her down.

Corvina grabbed both Agis and Anne by the arms and dragged them up the stairs, neither of them resisting this time. But even as they started to run, they could still hear Eva catching up behind them.

“You made Anne happy, you know! That’s why I kept you around. She loved the idea of having a family. Of having a brother. How would she feel now, knowing you never even noticed she was gone? How would she feel knowing you replaced her so easily? Knowing you chose the impostor over her?”

Anne couldn’t stop herself from talking still, even as she gasped for air, running as fast as possible through the confusing hallways and back rooms of the abandoned wing.

“I didn’t… intend to replace her… But I… never had much family either… and it really meant… a lot to me to have a brother… like you…”

They were almost out of the abandoned wing when Eva appeared in front of them again. It was obviously by magic this time, as she appeared out of thin air, wisps of dark smoke rising out of her open wounds.

Corvina pulled another dagger from her other boot. “You have nothing to taunt me or mock me with,” she said, her voice confident and clear. “I know everything and I’ve chosen to accept Anne, my Anne, as she is. As far as I’m concerned, you are the only monster here. And if you won’t get out of our way, then I will cut you down.”

Eva smiled and cocked her head to one side. “Cute,” she said.

Eva lunged.

Instead of using her dagger to parry Eva’s attack, Corvina lifted her leg and kicked Eva hard directly on the arrow wound in her leg, using Eva’s own momentum to increase the force of the blow. Eva screamed and fell down again, and only then did Corvina slam her dagger down towards Eva’s chest.

But there was a shimmering in the air and suddenly Eva was gone. Corvina slammed her dagger down onto the stone floor, sending a painful reverberation back up her arm.

Eva appeared again, hovering in midair, right above Corvina.

“Nice try,” said Eva. “But—”

Before she could even finish her sentence, Eva was knocked out of the air by Rain, charging at an incredible speed.

They both slammed against a nearby wall and ended up flat on the floor. Rain was the first to recover, jumping away much less gracefully than they usually would. They were clearly nursing a wounded leg of their own.

Rain looked over and made eye contact with Anne. They smiled weakly and made a small ‘go on then’ gesture.

Anne helped Corvina to her feet and the two of them and Agis ran out of the abandoned wing and into the church proper, leaving Eva and Rain behind.