The plain was grass and soft hills, an open space without visible borders. Somewhere, the edges of the Protected Space had to be laid, but she could not estimate where. ‘Wonder who is in control of the barrier,’ Metra thought, tempted to raise her hand and see if it was her. If she succeeded, it might as well have been an immediate surrender. ‘A Fateweaver has to be somewhere in here, if that lifeline is supposed to be in effect… man, modern people are spoiled. Having a guarantee not to die during duels.’

Metra arrived on a conspicuously barren piece of dirt in the otherwise verdant plain. A second was placed about twenty metres away. There, her opponent took position. The sun was to Metra’s left, giving neither of them the mild benefit of the daystar’s distracting light. Their eyes, albeit much greater than those of the average Abyssal, were not as harmed by the intense glow. Yet still, it was an advantage and every advantage could count.

‘Good on Gilgamesh to take this into account. Then again, there is no greater duelling freak than him. ‘The backbone of civilization is a battle fought with honour,’ I think that’s what he always liked to say. Certainly makes more fucking sense than ‘always try things thrice’.’

“You are a Metracana, yes?” the female voice echoed from the smooth, elongated head of the coral-horned humanoid. While waiting for Metra’s answer, she pulled at the remaining robes that covered her body in bright crimson.

“Metracana Metra, yes,” the Breaker of Armies responded, tapping her shoulder repeatedly with the shaft of her weapon. “Why?”

The robes suddenly loosened, turning into a bunch of red cloth in the hands of Liakan. Swiftly stuffing them into a dimensional pocket, she revealed the entirety of her body to the blonde berserker.

As with all of her kind, the primary two materials of her body were Mithril and that blue and purple sand. All of her exposed skin consisted of those materials and a third component: a metal that was as azure as the purest mana and shaped like uncut gems, despite its solid nature. It reminded Metra of a photo taken of the ocean. A static representation of something that should have been in motion.

Beyond its components, her naked body was surprisingly normal, if exceedingly thin. Flat breasts minorly curved her chest. The broadness of her ribcage transitioned into an unhealthily thin waist, consisting of plates that stretched out, revealing sinews of grains between them. Her hips were proportionally wide, her legs long and double-jointed, ending with the kind of claws Metra connected with most dragons, particularly of the western variety.

“I can still feel her touch on you. It is faint, but it is there.” Liakan extended a hand off to the side and gripped something. Sands streamed out of her veins, forming the object and expanding it. Within a split second, the azure and purple consolidated into a halberd.

Its design was, despite its constant crackling, less ornate than Rex Magnar. The axe blade was of moderate size, the spike at the back simply straight, the thorn at the tip a pointy pyramid shape. Had it not been for its entirely magical make, the half-crystal, half-sand armament would have looked entirely mundane, fitting for a foot soldier.

“We are both wayward daughters.”

A sudden loud boom, and silver light illuminated the battlefield. Metra lost not a second to unnecessary conversation, just rushed forwards and was met halfway by her opponent. Halberds clashed, the three-pronged heads hooking into one another in a devastating impact. Where they met, the grass was uprooted and blasted outwards, or flattened to the ground to the point of near non-existence.

The shape of the weapons meant that the blocked forwards force had to be translated into some other direction. Sharing the same thought, they both directed their weapons downwards. The spikes buried into the now exposed dirt, the shafts folded upwards like a closing scissor, and the two women slammed forehead to forehead.

Arcane sparks flew. A variant of Particle Skin manifested as sharp scales, covering the smoothness of Liakan’s elongated head and cutting into Metra’s skin. The First of Wrath embraced the pain, pulled her lips back, and growled, teeth bared.

‘Rein in your anger,’ she heard John’s voice in her head. A memory, not an actual connection. ‘Your ramp-up is as gradual as you can control it and that makes it an important measurement tool.’

The ground under Metra’s feet glowed an intense azure. ‘Sorry, my king, I don’t think I have the luxury to be a measurement today.’

Letting go of her halberd, the First of Wrath jumped back moments before the arcane circle under her feet could reach maturity. A torrent of scorching light erupted from the floor, as much flowing illumination as it was crackling lighting. The particles of mana spread outwards in a thin veil – the typical fog left behind in the wake of arcane attacks of incredible power or sloppy execution.

In this case it seemed to be both, although Metra had seen too much to assume a sloppily cast spell at this level was anything but an unorthodox pursuit of power.

Liakan burst out of her still cascading spell, her body clad in a protective shell of translucent scales. Arcane crystals hung around her shoulders, like shards of a great eternity of power. ‘Shardbound,’ Metra recognized another one of John’s old spells. Considering the ages involved, it was more likely that the Gamer had inherited a spell originally created by the Azure Tribe.

The thin enemy descended at rapid speed, ethereal wings behind her back burning mana to accelerate her every movement. Halberds clashed once again, the distorted sounds of the arcane crackling in an attempt to overpower Rex Magnar’s aggressive shredding. Metra’s lips twisted into a wrathful grin, the impact making her arms and knees budge – but nothing more.

She was stronger.

The arcane acceleration stopped suddenly, burning wings fizzling out. Liakan delivered a swift kick to Metra’s shoulder, pushing herself backwards. Ready to give chase, Metra had to realign her priorities to the four shard projectiles coming her way. The first two, she dodged through her charge; the remaining two had been angled for that eventuality. Astrotium plates pushed, segment by segment, out from her skin and then replicated into neighbouring areas. The light brown of her left arm was clad in grey. The mana-rending claws that her king had granted her shattered the projectiles, turning them into yet more swirls in the arcane veil.

To the sound of quiet skitters, the mechanical plates of her armour spread over the majority of her form, stopping at her collar. Simultaneously, Liakan arrived back in the torrent of arcane. Her form was comparable to a bird on the crackling branches of a proud oak shaped from supernatural plasma. The energy torrented upwards to the sky and she rode the current to its zenith. An arc of energy followed the swing of her halberd.

Metra Ripped through the space between them. She clenched the asymmetrical horns of her enemy and tore her back. The graceful descent was turned into a sudden jerk downwards. The energies channelled from the fountain broke up into a hundred shards, like a meteorite cracking on impact with the atmosphere.

Air whistled through Metra’s teeth, pulled through the carnivorous array of pointy white protrusions. Launching Rex Magnar, she tore a corridor of fresh air through the arcane veil. Then, she began running. The shower of shattered spell work descended on her position. Explosion upon explosion of devastating energy filled the air. Initial waves of plasmatic heat and electricity were followed by an ambient discharge of the thickening veil.

Where skill failed the First of Wrath, grit pulled through. Any attack that could not be dodged, she refused to let hinder her. For every impact superheating her surface, she simply redoubled the force with which her boots hit the ground. Blonde hair melted and regenerated, the miniscule gaps between her armour segments fused into chunks, only to be repaired into their proper state. Yet the damage and the pain mounted. Yet none of that mattered. Only rage and loyalty did.

Liakan recovered her graceless descent swiftly enough to twist out of the way of Rex Magnar. A multitude of differently sized wings rose ethereally behind her, their purpose as impossible to achieve through reason as it was to read the order in which they were supposed to be arranged. From the size of a hand to the wing of a biplane, they spread out, only to collapse instantly again.

An azure comet more than a person, she left a thick trail of supernatural exhaust behind her. Both women headed straight for each other again. Both warriors raised a hand shortly before impact. Both daughters of chaos passed by one another.

Metra gripped Rex Magnar just as the weapon emerged from the Vector Break portal she had opened up behind her opponent. Swinging the weapon in a wide arc, she whirled around, shattering the multitude of arcane shards flying her way. The ground behind Liakan was alight with crystalline formations – each crater created by the cracked projectile its own origin point of intense energy discharges.

Metra grit her teeth and accepted the second wave of projectiles slamming into her armour. The pain surged through her, further stoking the rage she ever carried in her soul. Stabbing at incredible speed, she overwhelmed Liakan in her own attempt to swing her halberd – the tip of Rex Magnar tore through the Mithril covering the side of the arcane elemental’s ribcage, but bounced off the azure metal within.

A flurry of blows followed. Liakan swiped at Metra with mana blades extending her claws, delivering shallow cuts to the First of Wrath’s face. Spiked pauldrons of Astrotium sunk into a layer of blue and purple sand. With a kick, the member of the Azure Tribe freed herself from the impalement. Mana burned, distance was gained, then Metra sacrificed some of the Fury her king had granted her to Tear through the world. Liakan was prepared for the attack to her back, knocking Rex Magnar aside the moment Metra lunged through the portal.

Letting Rex Magnar fly off to the side, the First of Wrath blocked the swing of Liakan’s halberd with her forearms. Gripping the weapon with one hand, Metra pulled her opponent forwards, her other hand descending as slicing claws. Liakan’s smooth face, marked only by a pair of eyes, cracked open like Eliana’s mask. Shredding metal turned into uneven teeth, and a vast ocean of swirling grains within parted along her elongated jaw, forming running circles of gradient lilac.

The loud blare of the arcana ray burst through the air. The element of raw power was channelled into its most destructive form, catching Metra’s descending arm. Magic rending claws clashed with pure magic, the result the opposite of what the labels would imply. Even the greatest of axes could be stopped by a strong enough shield.

Metra’s arm was blown back, its surface melted and incandescent. Drowning surprise at this level of damage in rage, Metra tuned fully into her battle instincts. Releasing the halberd, she ducked under the energy beam originating from Liakan’s twisting neck. With a snapping movement, she rushed back up, delivering a high knee. The spike protruding from the joint area screeched against the particle scales. Either Liakan opted to only block selectively or there was a damage threshold such shallow hits did not overcome.

Both women took a step backwards. Rex Magnar appeared back in Metra’s hand. Swinging and stabbing, the two of them exchanged supersonic blows. The ground and the swirls of purple in the air rippled from the turbulence of their godlike exchange. Metra’s superior strength had only grown further, the gap increased to the point that Liakan could only block the attacks. Any advantage the First of Wrath had in speed was nearly neutralized by the constant pestering of spells she had to deal with.

Nearly.

A new arcana ray burst out from the gash in Liakan’s face. The opening cracked open further, turning into a quadrisected maw lined with chaotic teeth. Metra gripped Rex Magnar close to the head and by the base of the spike.

The weapon roared, straining against the impact with its wielder. The steady, thick beam of energy hit the Fusional with a sound like a distorted circular saw. Energy broke and dispersed, feeding further into the veil. All around them crackled like a cosmic cloud, turning what remained of the grassland purple with its hue.

The attack ebbed away. Metra could smell the feint. Ripping through the dimensions once again, she gripped Liakan’s foot and pulled it towards herself. It was just unbalancing enough that the suddenly resurgent attack was directed elsewhere. In that gap, Metra charged in.

Under her feet, the ground began to glow. The arcane geyser, ever present since the beginning of the fight, faded away as the light intensified. It appeared Liakan could only sustain one of that particular spell.

Taking her chances, Metra continued her charge. Liakan attempted to meet her with her own halberd. Rage still surged within Metra, her peak not yet within sight. “YOU ARE IN THE WAY OF MY MASTER’S AMBITIONS!” she roared and swung her halberd wide.

The member of the Azure Tribe ducked under the overenthusiastic trajectory of the axe blade. Grinning madly, Metra adjusted her two-handed grip and went for the real attack. The curved spike slammed down, screeching against the particle scales, then punching through them. Sinking in three fingers deep, Rex Magnar etched its shape into the metal and sands of Liakan’s shoulder. Then, Metra pulled hard on her weapon, gouging out the front of Liakan’s left collarbone and part of her chest.

Underneath Metra, the arcane glow had reached a painful intensity. She could feel the soles of her feet melt. Swiftly, she dropped through a portal, narrowly escaping the true extent of the geyser of destructive might.

Metra landed on wilting grass, far away from where they had fought so far. The land was scarred from arcane impacts and raw physical aftereffects of their clashes. Omnipresent, the shroud had spread through the entirety of the Protected Space, most concentrated, predictably, around where the former geyser had been and where the new geyser now was.

The First of Wrath inspected Rex Magnar. A liquid as viscous as blood but as blue as the purest mana adorned both the thorn and the spike of the weapon’s head. Her eyes snapped back to the arcane torrent, when Liakan stepped out, a hand on where Metra had caught her ribcage earlier. When the arcane elemental removed it, her fingers were covered in the same blue liquid.

“I was not aware I could still bleed,” Liakan confessed.

“I’ve heard that from a lot of people before, but this is the first time I can say there’s something more at play than your arrogance, daughter of chaos.” Grains of the blue and purple sands flowed into the affected areas, staunching the Manableed as best she could. Annoyingly, the condition had no attached anti-healing effect, so that was more effective than Metra would have liked it to be. ‘I’ll just have to make more wounds.’

“So, you knew, fellow daughter?” the arcane elemental asked.

Metra pointed at the coral horns, the four-way split maw, and the ethereal wings flickering behind her opponent in all their different sizes. “I know Mother Chaos’ marks when I see them. You must be one of the demigods she sired before Akkad.”

Liakan nodded, then closed her eyes. “I would love to chat further, but duty calls both of us.” The daughter of chaos raised her halberd in a loose grip of both hands, barely balancing the weapon on her thumbs. Metra immediately drew her arm back, but the words already flowed. “Let me flow freely…”

The wave of unleashed energy threw Rex Magnar backwards as if it was a leaf in a strong gust.

“…let me see it all…”

Metra crouched into a ready stance. The plates of her armour advanced the rest of the way, covering her face in a layer of stainless grey. Her eyes glowed green in the darkness of her helmet. Liakan’s remained closed.

“…and let the fog come.”

Liakan burst with energy uncontained.