The words of the manifested goddess shook me and it took all the strength I could muster to not let it show. Or at least not too much. I was at a loss for words though. Had I really been played? Had I been the fool to unwittingly break the chains that bound her? The idea alone was enough to make my stomach roil. Before this line of thought could become my undoing though I felt the touch of the Lover upon my mind. It was like balsam soothing my worries and driving away the thoughts troubling me.

“Don't let her words get to you. You weren't a tool that did her bidding, although she might think so.” The Lover's voice was barely more than a whisper in my mind yet it didn't give me the impression that it reached me from far away. Quite the opposite was true. It felt as if she were closer to me than ever. Light as her touch was it drove away all my worries. “We imprisoned her because we didn't know any better. And since then she has remained chained all too long. We think that you'll be able to do better than we did. Much better. For her to heal, or at least start healing, those chains needed to be broken first though.”

I was supposed to heal the Devourer's broken mind? How was I supposed to even begin? That revelation probably should have driven me to my knees and into despair. How was I supposed to do what the Maidens themselves hadn't been able to do? Instead of despair I felt excitement though. My pulse quickened and I flashed a smile at the manifest goddess across from me. “What are you to do with me?” I raised my weapon to challenge her. “You dance with me. That is what we will do.”

The nonplussed look on her face was worth more than all the money of the world. After a moment though it twisted into a furious snarl. “You almost sound like one of my sisters. No wonder since they decided to make you their puppet in this game.” She bared her teeth. “Let me beat that out of you!” As she spoke she whirled around that massive sword of hers with surprising ease. “I'll dance with you but take care lest you lose your head. This dance is not for puppets and simpletons!”

I hadn't been idle so far. As she spoke I had drawn in Mana to fuel a full array of spells to empower me. Agility and speed, endurance and brute strength. I went for all of it. I layered a Mage Shield over my actual shield and did the same with Mage Armor and my scale mail. What I did not bother with was the Blur spell. With a weapon like hers it wouldn't do me much good. Even if her aim was a little off that monstrous sword would still slam into me. I had little doubt about that.

Why would she go for an impractical weapon like that anyway? A brief foggy flashback left me with the impression that swords like this one had no place outside of fiction. Sure, it would deal tremendous damage but only if she managed to actually hit anything with it. She probably had to empower herself with spells in a way similar to me just to actually lift and swing that thing, especially with the ease she demonstrated so far. Well, I probably shouldn't complain. If she wanted to fight with one hand tied behind her back, all the better for me.

Her first swing reaffirmed my decision to dodge her attacks and not just by a slim margin, as the heavy blade smashed into the ground. The sword didn't have an easier time cutting the rock than my glaive but the pure force behind her swing send shrapnel flying everywhere. As she missed she growled and bared her teeth once more. “Hold still so I can squash you, bug! It will be right over. You better believe it!”

My brows furrowed a little, as I noticed a small detail, as she growled at me. No vampire fangs. Most curious. I couldn't waste any time pondering the implications though. I had to keep moving. I had to make sure to steer the fight away from Gash'zur as well, who only now was regaining her senses, at least to a degree. She still looked terrible. She didn't try to rejoin the fight. It wouldn't have made any sense anyway. Not in general and especially not considering the state she was in. This burden was mine and mine alone to bear. Well, with a little help from the Maidens. That was only fair after all.

With Gash'zur moving out of the way I did my best to move the fight in the direction of the stairs. It was a gamble, as my mobility would be restricted on those but in the end it would hopefully pay off. If we got all the way down I would have more room to move, dodge and counterattack. My opponent must have noticed, but she went along with it anyway. For her the chance to get me while on the stairs probably outweighed any potential advantage I might gain later on. She wasn't going easy on me though.

I couldn't let her just dictate the flow of the fight as she pleased either. The risk that she might be able to maneuver me into a trap that way was too big. I grinned at her again as I dodged another strike. “You want me to hold still? Have you always gone for the low hanging fruit like that?” Before she could lift her sword again from where it had smashed into the ground, I jumped forward for a simple jab. It wasn't an extravagant attack but the goddess was overextended. She wouldn't get her sword back up for a parry in time and she couldn't dodge without letting go of it entirely either.

She wasn't defenseless though as I found out in short order. The tip of my blade hit an invisible barrier and afterwards the titanium edge slid across an invisible field of force before it could ever even touch the jagged plate mail the goddess had conjured for herself. She had protected herself with a Mage Armor spell, or something similar at least, as well. It really wasn't that big of a surprise. I quickly jumped back out of range to avoid her counter, a clumsy, low swing.

Well, I had learned a little more about my opponent and we were a few steps closer to the stairs. She brought her sword around in another overhead chop. It was clumsy. It was slow. It left her wide open. I couldn't exploit that opening though. Not without risking getting hit by that monstrous chunk of steel that pretended to be a sword. She snarled as she missed again. “Low hanging fruit. High hanging fruit. It doesn't matter. In the end I get them all. Keep hopping around all you want. It wont matter in the end. Eventually you'll grow tired while I wont.”

I snorted. She wasn't actually wrong. Eventually I would tire. Eventually I would slip up. I didn't have to let her know that I agreed with her though. Instead of attacking her again right away I gathered some Mana to feed into the enchantment of my weapon. As her next attack left her overextended as well I struck. I triggered the antimagic enchantment as I jabbed at her again. This time my blade wasn't deflected by an invisible field of force. It bit deep into her flesh under her right axle only to scrape across bone with the noise of metal scraping across metal. Still I decided to add some insult to injury. “Could it be that you have been spoiled too much when you were younger? Or do you really think you are the incarnation of entropy?”

For anyone else that would have been a mortal wound. Not for her though. As I withdrew my weapon again only a few drops of steaming hot blood hit the ground. Her face turned furious though and I somehow had the feeling that it was not due to what seemed to be only a minor scrape for her. No, it had to be my words that had hit a nerve. Then I was too busy dodging to worry any further as she came at me worse than she had before.