Eisha glared at Peacemaker, who stood far behind her attackers—both the knights and the robed men.
"It will only get worse from here, Aureisha."
Eisha looked at her side with a scrunched face. She released her hand briefly and watched the blood pour down her side before returning her gaze to Peacemaker.
"You disgusting old man. Your days are numbered!"
She swirled the ring of flame in one hand. The swirling intensified and created a hypnotic pattern that blazed forth even brighter.
Fire exploded from this pattern and consumed everyone in a vortex. Eisha, at the center of it all, shot toward her child and snatched her up. The remaining five rings flowed behind her instantly. They erected a shield of flames that blocked the wind spears bombarding her the moment she raced toward her child.
She lunged forward, sprinting with desperate haste. The circles protected her back. But it wasn’t enough.
Peacemaker... the man’s hooded face appeared before her, causing her to stagger back mid-motion. She righted herself with a brutal spin and launched into the air.
However, Peacemaker was already airborne. He clenched his fists together like a hammer, raised them above his head, and as she lunged upward, he came crashing down.
His fists fell like thunderclaps and smashed her back to the ground, heedless of the baby in her arms.
The ground shuddered and split, cracks running wide and chunks of debris exploding upward.
Peacemaker descended through the dusty haze to grab Eisha from the crater’s center. But his mouth opened slightly in shock as he saw no one there.
At that moment, she revealed herself behind him. Her leg... flew toward his head and crushed it from the side. He went rolling away, shattering the ground as he crashed through it.
Eisha didn’t wait. The rest of her attackers were already upon her. The knights swung wide arcs as they advanced heavily. The robed men exploded with air and speed, reaching for her.
But Eisha simply spun with momentum and shot out of their path with astonishing speed.
Not being a speed-talent Drifter, her movements were remarkable.
The rings of flames—all six—covered her back instantly. They released a torrent of fire that formed a wall. The wall rolled forward and collided with the knights and robed men, burning them with vicious heat.
Their screams echoed into the distant night as they suffered. Some were tougher; they pushed through the wall of fire, letting it burn only their cloaks, and continued their pursuit.
Eisha didn’t know where she was running. She wasn’t looking for help from anyone. It seemed the Kageyama clan had even allowed the elves to find her, so she and her husband were doomed.
But she needed to find Shin at all costs. Together, they could escape this place.
She looked at the child in her arms with an expression of anguish, then hardened her face and pressed forward.
Her pursuers were relentless, chasing her through the canyon’s corners. No matter how far she ran, the landscape didn’t seem to change, and she saw no fortress in sight.
She should have known something was wrong when she and Shin were escorted this deep into the mountains with the excuse of no free rooms except this place.
They had obviously been preparing for this.
Eisha’s bleeding worsened, and her pursuers clung to her like a shadow.
Then she hit a dead end. Eisha’s eyes widened as she faced a slope she’d need to climb.
The Kageyama clan had strange terrain. The thing about all these slopes and their general landscape was that they were all easily accessible from within. After all, she and Shin had been brought this far simply by walking through dark hallways.
But externally, traversing them was nearly impossible.
Eisha stared at the slope, her face turning bleak and colorless as she realized this was the end.
Her pursuers caught up and finally formed an arc around her, surrounding her from all sides.
All of them—the elves and the knights—were poised to strike.
And Peacemaker’s voice boomed with laughter as he arrived.
"Princess. I told you it was enough. Look at you. This is the end of everything—your excursion in this fake world is over. Time to go back home."
Eisha gritted her teeth.
"Yes. Sure. After I kill you."
She made a vicious grin as her rings flew toward her. But Peacemaker moved like lightning. His fist shot forward and came down on one ring, shattering it at the edge. He flowed like the wind and grabbed another—immediately, the fire vaporized.
With the one in his hand, he knocked the third and fourth off trajectory, sending them flying in different directions into the sky. Then he hurled the one in his grasp and smashed the ring that had nearly reached Eisha, all while moving fast enough to catch the last one.
He looked at it with a scoff and crushed it as he walked back.
Then he looked at Eisha.
"The toy your mother gave you is broken. Let’s see how you’re going to protect yourself now."
Eisha stared, eyes wide, tears streaming down her face.
Those flame rings meant everything to her. They were the last keepsake of her mother—the only thing connecting them. It was a weapon her mother had forged using ancient spell craft.
A weapon that allowed her to manipulate fire to a considerable degree, but the true destructiveness lay in the rings themselves. And just like that... the damned old man destroyed them.
Eisha gritted her teeth painfully as she stared down at the broken metal shards of her mother’s last gift.
Her lips trembled.
"Killing you... will be mercy."
Peacemaker raised his chin, and his lips curled into a smile.
"Let’s go home, Princess."
Eisha was broken—she had lost. She’d tried everything, but she’d lost in the end.
She wished she could have one last moment with Northern before being taken away. She wished she could tell him all the things she’d never said.
She wished she could hide nothing from him—let him know what a monster she truly was, instead of hoping he could be her chance at becoming a good person.
Tears streamed from Eisha’s eyes as Peacemaker drew closer.
However, Peacemaker stopped... and looked up.
He grimaced from beneath his hood.
"Huh..."
There was a figure at the slope’s peak—just standing there, looking down at them. Then it moved and leaped down.
Peacemaker quickly stepped back. The figure landed with a tremendous impact, dust and stone fragments flying everywhere. They all shielded their faces from the debris.
When the dust cleared, a creature with glossy black skin, crystalline eyes narrowed to slits, and a body that seemed sculpted by a master artisan stood before Eisha.
Everyone froze in shock, including Eisha. However, the strangest thing happened.
The figure turned to Eisha and lowered itself to one knee. A line formed on its face, opening into a mouth, and a cold, grating voice emerged.
"Mo...ther."