Yuriko’s sunblade glanced off the lead barbarian’s exposed Geist. The Radiant edge chipped at the Animus but didn’t burn it away. That threw her off for a moment, enough that her condensed Anima took a blow from the man’s axe.

The weapon was made of stone, of all things, and not even sharpened. In fact, it was more a blunt instrument than a sharp one; a fancy club. Still, his Animus coated the weapon’s head.

Yuriko’s condensed Anima wasn’t as simple as pressing it down until it was next to her skin. Well, it was that simple before, but not when her Anima’s volume increased so much when she passed the World Trials. No, simply pressing down on the edge made the resulting layer so thick that it became a bit harder to move and feel. It was like she wore a particularly thick glove and tried to pick up a needle that had fallen onto a marble slab.

Instead, she layered her Anima into dense and er, not-dense parts. Only then did she squish everything back down. It worked as long as she spaced out the dense layers. Also, her perception extended throughout her Anima, even if the dense portion also made that perception feel thicker.

The axehead smashed into the condensed part of her Anima, and its force was ablated and deflected, into the air, and down into the ground. Even though the strike was horizontal, the snow around her feet puffed away and the ground sank ever so slightly.

Having all kinetic force ablated in such a manner resulted in the axe just sitting in midair while the barbarian blinked in confusion. At least until she kicked him right between the legs. He managed to twist his hips in such a way that her toes grazed his inner thigh instead. With her time perception sped up, she could actually see ripples across his flesh from where she hit him. She could see his face distorted in pain and anger too, then his Geist flared with Animus and he sped up. He wasn’t as fast as she was though…maybe by three-fourths?

He reared back, pulling his weapon with him, aimed at her shoulder and swung with all of his might. Yuriko could see his muscles bunch up. His veins protruded from his biceps and forearms, even across his chest. She was sure the same would have happened on his legs if he wasn’t wearing trousers. She sidestepped and used her kinesis to nudge the angle of his blow once it entered the defused Anima flare. That, along with her movement, pushed her clear of his attack. But not against the other barbarian with the spear.

He had been hidden behind the first one’s bulk, and if not for her Anima, she would have been skewered before she noticed. Another spear thrust out from the lead barbarian’s other side. She would be hit if she dodged in either direction.

Her sunblade deflected the spear thrust, but the blow was heavy enough that she only moved the point by a single inch. It gleamed with hostile Animus, cold and savage. The point dug into her condensed Anima, which slowed it enough that the point only touched her coat. But the freezing touch spread out into her body, passing through the temperature regulation of her overcoat, and slowed down her reactions enough that the lead barbarian managed to grab her coat over her bosom, his fingers dug into the condensed Anima enough that he managed a grip.

Panic, anger, and skill. The combination had her drive the sunshards into the man’s hands, and each of the shards struck a finger, and the last one pierced his wrist. She followed up by kicking off from his knee. He tripped into the snow as she soared away and landed nearly a dozen paces back.

There was another barbarian behind the spearwielders, and even as Yuriko landed on her feet, she had to jump, duck, and roll to avoid the javelin the last man threw. It slammed into the snow and earth, creating a puff of ice. Then the javelin quivered and flew back into the barbarian’s hand.

Breathing hard, Yuriko took the moment to glance to either side. The area was clear of the weaker barbarians, but another two climbed up from the cliff. If they were as strong as the four already attacking her…

Her eyes narrowed as she thought furiously. While she had been using the sword dances, she hadn’t even tried to apply the Four Phases. She wasn’t confident enough to use it against opponents of this calibre. If she tried she was likely to fumble and give an opening. And from how one’s spear managed to pierce through her Anima, there was little room for error.

You don’t need to defeat them. What is your objective?

‘Stall them long enough for Gwendith, Desire, and the others to get away.’

With that in mind, using Fri’Avgi would shorten how long she could be effective in combat. With just the dances, the sunblades, and sunshards, she could keep fighting for hours. That could stretch even further if she kept some focus on using the ambient Chaos converter runescript weaving in her Anima going.

Well, she wouldn’t say no to reducing the barbarians’ elite forces.

Her musing concluded in the blink of an eye. She focused the sunshards to harry the javelin thrower. That barbarian was shorter than the others, a couple of inches shorter than herself too. He had a wiry look, but there was not a Jin of extra fat on his frame. If they weren’t barbarians…

Well, nothing wrong with admiring a nice physique, though she shoved those thoughts to the back of her mind as soon as they surfaced. In the meantime, she rushed at the axeman, feinted to his left, jumped back, and sent an ice pellet at his eye. He jerked his head back, but the projectile scored a gash along his forehead. He staggered to the side, face turning a shade of green.

She sent another ice pellet at one of the spearmen, who looked so alike to each other that she couldn’t tell them apart. The pellet pierced the left spearman’s forehead then exited the back. But something was wrong. There was no blood. The spearman shimmered for a moment, and he gave her a fierce and mocking grin.

So. They weren’t twins, but a single person. A javelin was flung her way but was wildly off course. The shards punished him for his distraction, piercing and cutting. Plumes of vaporized blood puffed around him, but he still managed to keep the shards from ending his life. Ah, no. His Geist protected him. The materialized aura looked thinner and a bit faded. Perhaps a couple more blows would end him.

A scream of rage came from one of the reinforcements. He had a poleaxe held over his head which he smashed down at her. But it would fall short. She was sure of it! The pole wasn’t long enough…and then, of course, it extended. Or rather, the whole thing enlarged so that the axehead looked almost as big as she was tall.

But it was only big. She slapped the side of it with her palm, and together with some assistance from her kinesis, deflected the blow straight into the fallen barbarian axeman. The attacker desperately tried to lift the weapon, but Yuriko added a bit of force downwards, and the result was that it punted the other barbarian away. The sixth one charged at her with his head lowered. A large horn materialized from his forehead.

Gritting her teeth, she caught the man’s horn by the tip with her left hand. Her feet dug twin furrows into the earth as his momentum pushed her several paces back, but she managed to keep hold. Then, with a savage twist, she rotated the horn and would have broken the man’s neck if he had not thrown himself in the direction of the movement. She stabbed at his shoulder with the sunblade and the tip pierced into his deltoid muscles. The sizzling and popping of burning flesh filled the air along with his scream of pain.

She stepped forward, realizing right then and there that even if the barbarian spearman that was thrusting his spear directly at her struck true, her condensed Anima would keep her safe. And she could take the blow while she finished off the horned man.

All of her practice, with the sword, with the Plasma Caster, and with other weapons, had been to avoid getting hit. Keep herself safe and more chances would appear to strike back. But the Ancient’s Way changed everything. Trade blow for blow and she would live through the fight, even wounded, while her enemy died. Dance around the fight and there was a bigger chance that both of them would live to fight another day.

She was outnumbered. If she doesn't take one of them out now, they’d keep hounding her until she either runs out of Animus or they reach the people she tried to protect. So, gritting her teeth, she ignored the spear thrust and stabbed the horned man’s face with her sunblade.

The blade stabbed through the man’s skull. The spearpoint ablated through her condensed Anima and stabbed into her side. Where the point, slowed to a crawl, was stymied by her Radiant empowered skin.

The barbarian’s jaw hung slack while he stared at the point of his spear. It pierced through her overcoat…

“You rotter!” she swore out loud, “don’t ruin my clothes!”

Then she grabbed the spear and pushed it away. As she twisted and yanked, the barbarian’s instinct was to keep hold of his weapon so he was pulled along. He released it just in time to scramble away from her swipe. The tip of the sunblade carved a line across his nose while tears and snot filled his face.

Then she caught the axeman’s attack with her left hand and stopped the swinging axe cold as the edge rested on her palm. She stared at the man who was frozen in both surprise and terror.

“You’re not strong enough to hurt me,” she said. Too bad they probably couldn’t understand her.

Her Mien throbbed and she felt her core pulse. The remaining three barbarians shuddered and their expressions quickly turned from determination to fear.

Yuriko yanked the axehead, hoping to pull the man closer, but he let go of his weapon as though it burned his hands. He spun on his heels and ran back towards Ouera Bo’s entrance. The others did the same.

Yuriko hesitated. She wanted to kill as many of them as she could now. But she also needed to safeguard her friends. If she chased after them, the other barbarians could avoid her and go after the free women.

Cursing under her breath, she flipped the axe to hold it by the handle, then threw it with all her might at the retreating warriors. Since she didn’t invest Animus into the throw, and even though it hit the man square in the back, he only staggered and fell, but scrambled to his feet and was away before the axe even bounced off the ground twice.

Aside from the dead horned man, the other four escaped. Ah, the javelin barbarian left an arm that had been severed by her shards.

She looked at the horde and saw them physically recoil when she took a step towards them. A moment later, they retreated and the field was hers. She slowly backed away, making sure that none of them tried to go around her. The plateau wasn’t that wide here and she could easily see the Veil. Unless they climbed up through another set of tunnels, then none would get past her. A couple of hours later and they were no longer in sight. She retracted her Anima to prevent it from giving away her position and she hurried back towards camp.

_________

Thaer couldn’t stop himself from grinning. It was that girl from back then. She’d grown stronger and was more beautiful than ever. He could feel desire and terror fill him in equal measure. He wanted her, and from the looks of his fellow young chieftains, they wanted her too.

They had kept back from the fighting, emerging on the plateau only in time to catch the tag end of her fight against the greater warriors. He wondered why she had appeared here though. Did the loss of his captive have anything to do with her? Well then. Time to gather up an expedition.

Still, with her being that powerful, he would need to ask the aid of the Progenitors. They couldn’t let a hostile force hold the plateau after all. Thaer hurried back inside Ouera Bo and sought an audience with his father.