Despite all evideo the trary, Prince Quell dispys he does, in fact, have some on sense in him as he skids to a stop just short of the cactus limb. I catch up half a sed ter, lunging around him and smming my shield into the ground as the cactus jabs in our dire. I activate Devour, which pleases the Aegis to no end, and the part of the vihat’s toug the shield vanishes as the Aegis happily es it. I shut Devour off just as quickly, and my mana drops to 46/50.

  [Devour, Level Up!] Echo announces. [At level two, the mana expenditure is reduced to 1 point every 2 seds.]

  “Wow,” Quell remarks. “You really do have to protect me!”

  A murderous impulse briefly threatens to overtake me. I exercise an impressive level of self-trol to stuff it back down. “You could have just believed me instead of putting both our lives at risk!”

  “A hypothesis left ued is as good as—”

  “Get back!” I shove him with my free hand as another vine es for us.

  Quell apparently wields all the dexterity of a toddler, because this just knocks him off his feet and bato the sand. I’d smack my forehead if I had the time.

  Instead, I activate Repel—dropping my mana down to 36/50—and Ehe virikes Aegis, and I don’t eve. I lift up the shield and sm it down on the limb, severing its end.

  If my math is right, I’ve got about six minutes on Eo take as many blows as I . After that I’ll be out of mana, but hopefully by then I’ll have stored up enough hits for Repel to do some damage.

  Ear and Xamireb take up defensive positions oher side of Quell while he looks up at me from the sand with wide, surprised eyes.

  “Fug stay here,” I tell him, which summons horrified looks from the soldiers. I guess they’re not used to people talking to their royalty that way. Tough luck. I’ve never been much for etiquette.

  I rato the fight, specifically targeting the biggest limbs. I crash through them like a wreg ball thanks to Ehe limbs snapping in half across the front of the Aegis.

  [Repel, Level Up!] Echo decres as I progress. [Endure, Level Up!]

  More notifications stream through my vision, but I mentally shove them to the side; I o keep my wits about me while I’m in the middle of a fight.

  Darian and Prince stance are ihick of it, and I fight my way toward them as fast as I’m able. It’s only as I approach them that I realize the draw the Aegis is sensing isn’t to the fight itself—nor to the carrion cactus—but to Prince stance. Or rather, the sword in Prince stance’s hand.

  The bd red bde he wields appears eerily familiar. There’s an eye-like ruby stone in its guard, and the metal is so dark it’s nearly bck. Red light runs up the bde and swirls around its hilt in a miasma of magic. Even as the Crimson Aegis feels drawn to it, I feel the sword reflect that attention back at us.

  stance’s head snaps our way, and his gaze locks onto the Aegis in a look of surprise. Then it shifts up to me.

  He disengages from the fight, letting Darian take his pce.

  “How did you acquire that shield?” he demands.

  The Aegis is still urging me on, pulsively drawn to the sword. I ’t even tell what the shield wants—if it wants anything at all, or if it’s merely ag on instinct. From the way stance draws back, angling his sword away from me, he must feel it, too.

  “I, uh, found it lying in the desert,” I say.

  He gives me a look of extreme incredulity.

  “I know how it sounds,” I huff.

  A vine whips in our dire, and I duck behind the Aegis. stance whips out his sword, sshing through the limb. The severed vine falls to the grouween us.

  “We’ll discuss this ter,” he says. “If you’re here to fight, then fight. Captain Darian could use assistance. I hold my own.”

  A protest rises and dies on my tongue. I also hold my own, I think. But I only lucked out i two fights, and stance has already moved away; far enough to fight indepely, but close enough to keep an eye on me. I still feel the Aegis yearning after his sword. Maybe it’s for the best we’re not side-by-side in the middle of battle. I turn my attention to Darian and approach her instead.

  [Mana: 27/50]

  Just another couple minutes left on Endure and these blows will start to feel like something. We o resolve this fight, and fast.

  The Captain also seems surprised to see me, but she jerks her head anyway, signaling me over.

  “Where in the Kingdom did you get a shield like that?” Darian asks.

  “Found it in the sand,” I repeat.

  She barks out a ugh. “Shit. Well, I’m not about to arrest you this sed. You want to prove yourself? Cover me.”

  I’m more than happy to block the few blows that e her ieces of spiny, wet vegetation spttering off to either side as the cactus beats itself to pieces against me. Darian falls back, dropping her sword to the ground to sweep a circle and some squiggly symbols through the sand. She speaks a word, and an e light fills the circle. Then the whole design colpses inward, the sand f into a solid rock.

  “Move!” Darian orders.

  I step to the side, and the roches from the ground like a onball. It bsts into the main stalk half, carving a divot out of its side. If she’d hit straight on, it might have cut the thing in half.

  Darian swears, then steps up beside me to resume fighting with her sword. Other soldiers are simirly shooting rocks and fireballs at it, but the only ohat match the size of Darian’s shots are performed by groups of soldiers w in tandem. stance, meanwhile, is hanging back, cutting down anything that makes it through the front line of soldiers. I ’t help but watch him, even while embroiled in my own fight; his power and grace is almost hypnotic.

  One vine makes it around the soldiers and spears toward a tent. stance lunges after it, even though he’s far from within striking rahe miasma around his sword solidifies, however, aends to be twice, three times the length of his bde. It sshes through the stalk, which disies to ash, much like the effects of the Crimson Aegis’s Devour. No wonder he’s hanging back; he’s stopping the fight from spilling over into the rest of the camp.

  [Maed. Endure spell expired.]

  I stumble back from the vihat strikes my shield, red light fshing over its surface. Repel is still doing its thing, st up energy with every attack, but now that Endure is done, I won’t be able to stand against the blows much longer. I o get close and expel the bst. Hopefully, this time, it’ll be enough to finish off the damage the other soldiers have started.

  The Aegis gets excited as it catches wind of my pn. Yes! Revehis time our Repel will take the pnt monster down.

  “Except this is twice as big as the st one,” I grumble. “We don’t have nearly enough stored power to take it down.”

  “What?” Darian asks.

  I shake my head. “Nothing.”

  Aegis disagrees with me vehemently, being all the more determio prove its superiority. It focuses on the base of the carrion cactus. There! That is where we’ll unch our attack.

  I frown. You mean we focus Repel? I think. I figure si read my thoughts anyway, I don’t o be replying to it out loud and making everyone arouhink I’m crazier than they already do. It doesn’t have to be a big shockwave?

  Aegis is offended. Of course not! As if it would ck such precision. It is a highly adaptable shield, which is what makes it the best.

  Good lord, this thing is full of itself. At least it would be more tolerable if it didn’t keep fetting to tell me all the abilities it has.

  Aegis is equally insulted by this. (Apparently, anything that isn’t unadulterated praise is an insult.) It tell me everything! But I keep putting it in that between space. It hasn’t had a ce to get a word in.

  I snort at that. Yeah, it’s real reserved. But there will be time to pick its brain ter—or whatever brain-like equivalent a demon shield has—assuming it’ll really be as cooperative as it cims. For now, though, we’ve got a cactus moo take care of.

  “My turn for cover,” I tell Darian. “I’ve got something that might end this, but I’ll o get closer enough for a clear shot.”

  “What do you mean?” she asks. “You only have a shield.”

  “If it is what I think it is,” stance says, sshing his way back over to us, “it do far more than block. Isn’t that right?”

  I ’t help but be drawn to his swain. The Aegis wants it. Needs it!

  What do you want with it? I wonder.

  But the Aegis ’t even expin. It just knows they’re supposed to be together.

  “It’s got a few offensive abilities,” I say, meeting stance’s gaze. He, too, is staring at the Aegis, almost a hungry look in his eyes. In this moment, I see some resembo his brother. He, too, relutly looks away.

  “If it’s a distra you hat is something I provide,” he says.

  “Sure,” I say, even though he’s already turning away from me. Strangely, he sheathes his sword and the mental itch the Aegis was vanishes as a result. I let out a relieved breath. “What are you going to…”

  Prince stanhales, raising his hands before him. Light sparks at his fiips. When he exhales, it’s like his breath has caught the light on his hands and tossed it up into the air. The colors swirl into a funnel, growing rger, brighter, more solid. In mere moments, it resolves into the form of a sed carrion cactus, exactly replig the first.

  I stare at the incredible dispy of magic. The inal carrion cactus likewise appears surprised. It shrieks, drawing its limbs back, before stabbing at the neeared creature. The vine appears to skewer straight through the replica, sending a quiver through the creature like a ripple across a projector s. stance’s carrion cactus sways to the side, slipping through the vine unharmed, theurns a challenging screech of its own.

  “Well?” Darian demands, breaking me from my awe. “Hurry up! If you’ve got a po it!”

  “Sorry—right.” I tear my gaze away from the dueling giants aurn my focus to the maiure’s stalk. Brag my free hand against the Aegis, I duck my head low, put my shoulder into it, and stalk forward. Despite stance’s distra, some of the smaller feelers still head my way. A few deflect off the front of my shield, but some also e from the sides. Darian makes quick work of these, shredding anything that veoo close. She’s incredibly profit with a sword, slig away attacks I don’t even see ing. I’ve got to get her to teach me some of the basiaybe stance teach me some of that magic.

  You know, assuming they don’t throw me in cell at the end of all this.

  As we get close, the attacks beore pressing, the stalks much thicker and their strikes more powerful. Is this close enough? I ask the Aegis. We only have one shot and we ’t afford to miss.

  Miss? It would never miss. The Aegis is infallible! Though of course, getting closer would make its perfect aim even more perfect.

  I grimace. I don’t think you knoerfect means.

  But this is as far as I’m willing to push it. I focus on the base of the carrion cactus. Do I just have to picture it? Intend for the attack to be focused instead of broad? I’m not really sure if I’m the one trolling the spell, or if Aegis is. Either way, I will for the attack to un a thin, trated bst, and Echo says, [Repel executed.]

  A fsh of red light bursts from Aegis. It fires straight forward like a bolt of lightning, spearing through the stalk of the pnt and—thankfully—burying itself in the sand oher side. It’s a good thing I hadn’t aimed it any higher, or I could have hit soldiers oher side of camp.

  I blink against the light, a hole burned in the ter of my vision. Was that enough? Did I sever it? I gnce off to the side to try to make out the damage with the part of my night vision that hasn’t just been wiped out.

  “Back!” Darian shouts, a hand on my shoulder.

  I stumble from the ued pull and nearly fall backward myself. (I guess I shouldn’t have been so hard on Quell for falling on his ass when I pushed him.) I mao keep upright, but then the pull turns into a shove, something hard kicks against my heel, and I slip over the sand as my leg gives out and the weight of the shield pulls me over. I crash to the sand, and a moment ter, something sms into the grouo me, sending a shockwave through the camp.

  My vision hasn’t fully recovered yet, but it’s not hard to make out the fallen stalk of the carrion cactus inches away from my feet. Right where I’d been standing only moments before.

  [Role Requirement fulfilled,] Echo says matter-of-factly.

  [Sanity Level: 100%]