Vol.4 Ch.71 – Teamwork

Chapter 71: Teamwork

Mare was furious. Really, truly furious.

She hadn't expected to be quite this upset. Any of them being in danger should have made her furious but that thing had taken Aurora of all people, someone she cherished far more than those few days should have caused her to.

But the funny thing about the way Mare's mind work was that she didn't process anger the way other people did. She didn't lash out, didn't see red and didn't lose her cool. Her anger wasn't a burning flame, it was deepest, darkest everfrost. Her mind went blank and clear, razor focused on two things. One, save Aurora. Two, rip that thing to shreds.

There had to be something they could do, something she could do.

Memory magic was weird, much weirder than people thought. It didn't just let her dive into people's memories and pluck floating memories out of the air, it also let her find people. It required a certain degree of familiarity to work but given that a memento was enough to do the trick, the connection Mare shared with Aurora more than qualified. She'd been inside her, both her mind and her body, and she knew the girl better than anyone else.

And so she sought out the thread of memories. She'd never done this across planes of existence but she was convinced it would work. And so she tuned out everyone and everything and just let herself fall into her magic. If she'd opened her eyes she would have seen a cloud of Winds so dense she wouldn't have been able to see through it, all drawn to her frigid fury.

It was like playing hide and seek in the dark, like seeking a needle in a haystack. There was a light there, a thread to follow. And follow it she did, inch by inch. She felt her body moving, walking across the room to where the trace was strongest. She probably looked ridiculous but she didn't care. If there was a chance to save Aurora then she'd accept any humiliation.

And finally she had it. A thread, very nearly tangible, stuck in a hole in reality that had closed.

No, this wasn't how it would end, able to find the trace but unable to do anything with it. There had to be a way to wrench this open, a way to reach whatever hellscape Void Stalkers could escape to. She just had to find it.

**

For being giant leeches sucking the brains of corpses these monsters were really rather tough. Annoyingly so.

The last thing Ophelia wanted was for their group to exhaust themselves before the Necromancer. And she had a way to end this. It would exhaust her, probably, but she knew how to get her strength back. The only concern was something she'd heard once, though she couldn't remember if it had been from Jeanne or Elaine. She had the same magical affinities as Omega, the brooding angel, except while these elements – water, metal and shadow – were commonly referred to as blood magic, Omega hated the term. But it was quite fitting. Even if he had hangups about it, about using blood for his magic, it was effective. And if it upset him, so be it.

She raised her blood daggers and sliced along her backs of her hands, coating the things in blood. Immediately their blades grew until she held two wicked cutlasses. The blood hadn't solidified, no. It was held in the shape of blades but when it came down to it this was nothing but rapidly swirling water, so rapid that it cut like razors. She summoned forth shadow magic and tossed globs of the stuff all around the room, creating dark patches that blotted out the eerie light.

And then she dove into the shadows.

She jumped out near one of the Mind Suckers and carved through both the leech and the host body, then summoned metal and shadow. Dark tendrils reached out of the pool of shadows, tipped in wickedly sharp metal blades that clamped down on the creature she had struck, making sure it stayed dead. But she didn't stay to make sure it died. Instead she jumped back into the shadows and back out in front of the next one, striking them and then finishing them off with bladed shadows, again and again until there were none left.

It was rough. If she hadn't been a vampire she would have collapsed right after and even as a vampire this had been bad. Not only had she just worked magic that, judging by the look Kaja gave her, had been beyond the abilities of a mortal mage, she had also expended a large amount of blood to do it. The daggers didn't just kiss her skin once and then were sated, no. They were a continuous drain, replenishing themselves from her body after every swing.

The ability Elaine had let her unlock had turned off the incessant aching hunger, the one that had been so constant she was still getting used to not feeling it anymore, but that didn't mean she had an infinite supply of blood on her hands. She might even recover on her own thanks to that ability but that would take time they didn't have. But she didn't have to do this on her own.

Her knees buckled.

It hadn't been intentional, hadn't been meant to draw sympathy. She actually had exhausted herself that badly. And Alexis was there to catch her. Funny, in a way. She had a couple inches and a couple pounds on Alexis and before Project Divinity Ophelia had been strong enough to snap her like a twig but now Alexis was the strong one, the rock that others could lean against. Wasn't there some story about Lugh tying himself to a tree so he could continue to fight even though his entrails were already spilling on the ground? Ophelia hoped Alexis would never have to go that far but the steel in those arms holding her up sure felt strong enough for that kind of determination.

“That was stupid of you,” Alexis told her.

“It sure did the trick though, huh?” Ophelia quipped, though her voice came out raspy.

“What do you need?” Alexis said.

“Blood.” Such a simple word, yet for Ophelia it held all the meaning in the world.

“You owe me a steak after this,” Alexis said, then blushed as she heard herself. But despite her embarrassment she still opened her armor far enough to expose her throat to her.

“I'll take you out to dinner for this alright,” Ophelia promised and sank her teeth into the blonde's throat. It wasn't meant to be sexual but her saliva didn't care. But despite the moans and whimpers, despite the fact that Ophelia could smell Alexis' arousal through the armor, the blonde didn't buckle, didn't stop holding Ophelia in her arms.

With each swallow Ophelia felt her strength returning. Her body wasn't a perpetual motion machine but a kick start like this was just enough to switch her system back on. With a steady stream of blood her ability to slake her own thirst was no longer overwhelmed and sped up production, bringing her back to normal in a flash.

When she could stand under her own power again she pulled away from Alexis, intending to use her healing abilities on the girl, though she had no idea how good it was at replenishing lost blood.

Except, when she looked at Alexis' throat all she saw were two pinpricks that closed before her eyes. Oh dear. Apparently Alexis' natural regeneration was so strong it'd healed her without any contribution from Ophelia.

“Well that was a spectacle,” Kaja said, slightly louder than Ophelia felt like she had to.

“Twice over,” Cassie muttered.

**

Elaine could see Mare struggling. The girl had summoned forth an ungodly amount of Winds and had somehow managed to find something, some kind of trace of Aurora, but her expression was rapidly growing frustrated and terrified because she clearly couldn't do anything about it.

Even though it wasn't currently working it was still better than what Elaine had managed to do. She'd felt so helpless when that monster had grabbed Aurora but she knew she couldn't just feel sorry for herself. If she did, the girl was as good as dead. But if even Mare's memory powers weren't enough...

She had to think. She knew there had to be something. The thing had escaped into some kind of pocket dimension and all that was left was a single thread and a gate that couldn't be opened.

Hold on.

Gateways, alternate planes of existence. Vanishing friends.

“Liminality!” Elaine blurted, then rushed to Mare's side.

“What are you talking about?” Esther asked.

“That thing is in a liminal space between spaces,” Elaine explained. “There's a gateway here but we can't access it. All we have is a thread of memories leading through a door that won't open.”

“And that helps us how?”

“Because one of my Shard Bearers holds a Soul Shard of Hecate,” Elaine said, then summoned the Lampade Wand.

This would have to be incredibly precise. She'd never worked magic like this. But she had to make it work.

She summoned shadows to herself, coating the spot Mare and her stood in darkness. Yes, this could work.

“Need some help?” Typhon asked.

Does this have a chance of succeeding?, Elaine asked in her mind.

“Yes,” he said simply. “If you can focus on that thread you can do it. But you'll need Mare's help.”

“Got it,” Elaine said, accidentally speaking out loud.

“Got what?” Esther asked but Elaine tuned her out for the moment. She needed to focus. Shadow magic to create a tether for Aspect of Liminality. A thread of memory to tell her where to go. And a memory mage holding onto that thread for dear life.

She placed a hand on Mare's shoulder and channeled Ophelia's M-Skill through that thread. And suddenly she could feel them both getting sucked into the liminal space.

“Wait, what are you—“ Esther shouted and grabbed onto Elaine at the last second.

**

This shouldn't be so beautiful.

It was the first thought going through Elaine's mind as she saw the place.

They were in what looked like a cave. Or it would have looked like a cave, dark and rocky walls on all sides, except it didn't have a ceiling. Up above was a starry sky, though none of the stars looked like those on Earth. But even despite the sky above it still felt like a cave, dark and musty, the air stagnant. And it was full of spiderwebs, glittering in the starlight like shooting stars.

At the center of the cave hung Aurora, wrapped up in that same webbing. It didn't look like she was wrapped in a cocoon. She was spreadeagled and there was webbing around her torso and covering her mouth, her wings tied tightly to her body, but otherwise she looked normal. Most importantly, her chest still rose and fell, even if her head hung down. Unconscious but still alive. Good.

Although that left the question: Where was the Void Stalker?

“You really shouldn't have come here,” a voice boomed, sounding like it was coming from everywhere and nowhere.

“Give her back!” Mare demanded.

But Elaine's gaze was no longer fixed on Aurora. Instead she was staring at the stars above. Eight of them had turned red and they were swirling like the eyes of the creature had been. A moment later something huge shook the cavern. There was something above them but she couldn't make it out. The only way to see it was by the absence of stars, blotted out by the creature.

Elaine unfocused her eyes, trying to look without looking, and almost lost her lunch.

A spider loomed over them, large enough to blot out the sky, eight swirling red eyes the size of stars staring down on them.

“In your world, all you had to contend with was me,” the Void Stalker said, peeling itself out of the darkness of the cave. For a moment Elaine was comforted by the fact that that titanic spider was no the creature's true form but then she realized that this was cold comfort when both creatures were now focused on her, the thing they had failed to beat earlier and a spider the size of a galaxy. “But in here, we are legion.”