Anassa went mad, she became a Goddess, the end.

  This is where most stop at the analysis of Anassa, and it is where I tihose who are afflicted with standard insanities still be trained, mortals and divines both be ditioned in the same way dogs are trained. Everuly insane be taught basic behaviours through simple reunishment behavioural trainings.

  Anassa, I do not believe is possessed by madness iraditional fashion. She has a logical pattern for the world, but she chooses to exclude herself from those. All hierarchies exist, yet Anassa is not part of those hierarchies. Everyos dirty, yet not Anassa. Everyone needs a catalyst, yet not Anassa. Everyone be defeated, yet not Anassa. Every rule is meant to be followed, yet Anassa will exclude herself from them whilst simultaneously enf them. Everyone should feel bad about being a hypocrite, yet not Anassa.

  Anassa has not mastered magic, Sorcery as an art is merely catalyst-less magic. Powerful when awakened, but dangerous. I did not force every nation in the world to use catalysts, it is that every nation in the world simply worked out that using catalysts is far more effective. In the same way that no oaught humans to build homes, yet every culture has built some sort of structure to serve as a home. Magi be taught to almost everyone, all it requires is discipline. Sorcery kills arouy pert of people that try to master it.

  Anassa has mastered madness. She is aware of her own delusions. She is aware her logical reasoning is broke she does not care. Her mind is ohat works perfectly, yet in that perfe, it has realised its own limitations: Humans should not be Divines, Demesnes o exist to Divio form around them, Magic is simply more effit with catalysts. In the same way a knight throws his shield down to wield his bde with two hands, Anassa threw away her sanity to wield her delusion.

  - Excerpt from “Divine Assion”, written by Goddess Essa, of Magic. Kept within Essa’s private chambers in Arcadia.

  Dougs kicked his feet up as he sat on the foldable stool. Erik passed him a cigarette and lit his own as they watched the other pilots train. Airfield Six, there were twenty in total, and eae looked the exact same. A few hangars set up to cover pnes from snowstorms, and theher tents or caravans for the teams. Airfield Six was rather good though, it had a crete runway rather than one made of just battered dirt. “That, I’m not jealous of.” Erik said, the fresh-meat, that’s what everyone called new recruits, was being forced to run ps around the runway. Dougs ran one every m just for the sake of it, but he would always do it as the Sun was ing up over the horizon and the breeze was still cool. Now, with the midday Sun overhead and the air shimmering, it ractically torture. The fresh-meat was breathing heavily, their clothes so wet with sweat they may as well have just been dumped into a river.

  “her.” Dougs lit his cigarette as a few of the other Captains came to sit by. Officially, everyone was the same rank, but only Dougs and Erik piloted the Raptors, only Dougs and Erik participated iion Misfortune, only Dougs and Erik served as the private transports for Divines, only Dougs and Erik had a picture of themselves with Neneria ahe rank may be the same, but the unofficial hierarchy put Dougs and Erik somewhere just uhe level of Kassandora’s Generals. Even Ground and of this airfield carefully skirted them.

  “How’s it going?” Pat said. Ex-Cleric, from Allia. With a full head of hair and wearing a shirt. It was too hot here for anything.

  “Same old, same old. Done for today.” Dougs said as he nodded over to the other set of stools. “Scouting run.”

  Pat smiled as he sat down. “Talk is you found something.”

  “Fug tell me about.” Erik said.

  Dougs ughed and shook his head as he turned his head to look at his jet. A team of meics was loading Raptor Oh ammunition. A forklift was bringing bombs to it too. and had called off the scouting runs. Every pne was to be armed. “You won’t believe it even if I told you.” Dougs said.

  “Try me.” Pat replied as more of the pilots came around.

  “Giant bird.” Dougs said and Erik ughed.

  “It was a vulture actually.” The pilot of Raptor Two added. The other men shared looks amongst each other, a few chuckled. A few looked like they believed him. Most simply had ion.

  “’t be worse than flying over Essa.” One of the pilots said. Richard, this man. His hair cut short although it was regrowing. He had lost a bet a week ago and had to shave himself for it.

  “’t be worse than Essa, damn right.” Another said, this one, Dougs always fot the name of. And he alreteo remember because it was stupid to ask for someone’s name a dozen times. “I-“ The man never got to finish what he was saying, bring arms cut him off. The fresh-meat stopped their run, Dougs and Erik sat up immediately, and the rest of the captains started looking around.

  “Fuck.” Erik said as he smoked half his cigarette in one long drag. Dougs followed along. How he was supposed to make it through this job without some sort of addi, he had no clue.

  “Fudeed.” Dougs said.

  The howling arm stopped after five seds. Dougs was about to ask if there was a test scheduled wheerrible speaker started to talk. It was barely intelligible, Dougs only caught every sed word. “Arm. No. Test. All. To. Pnes. Frontlines. Attack. Urgent.”

  “Fug Hell.” Erik said. “That’s not us, is it?” And as if on cue, Dougs felt his phoart t. He pulled it out a his heart drop. This number called almost every day and it was somehow worse every siime: Ground trol. He swiped the green button to answer.

  “Captain Dougs speaking, what do you want?” Dougs said.

  It was Mosi. At this point, Dougs was on a first name basis with all the operators of the KAF lines. Mosi was a native Kirinyaan, he liked Lubskan Vodka, he had a rge family in the tryside, and he was in his early forties. Dougs had never met the man in person though. “Captain Dougs.” Mosi said politely. “Is Captain Erik with you?” Dougs looked to Erik and put the phone on loudspeaker.

  “He is.” Dougs said. “Richard and the KAF grunts are here too.”

  “Fuck off Doug.” One of the men said and Dougs gave him a smug grin. No one liked being called a grunt, but no one was on the level of prestige that the Raptors held either.

  “Good.” Mosi said. “Everyone is to get into the air and fly to Jungle Group tre. Make sure your pnes have ammunition.”

  “What’s happening?” Dougs asked and Mosi fell silent.

  “We…” Mosi said. “I don’t know, JGC requested air support. Reports are still ing in.”

  “It’s bad then?” Erik asked loudly enough from the side that the phone would pick him up.

  “I ’t say that.” Mosi said. “But I know the 77T squadrons have been sortied. and is sending everything to the west.” He fell silent for a moment, then his voice lowered to a whisper. “And I’m only saying it because it’s you two, but there’s rumours and called for Olephia.” And upon saying one simple he situation stopped being annoying. It was no longer just another job on the checklist. It was now serious. Dougs looked around at the other pilots. No one was ughing now, no one was even smiling. It was all hard looks, some nervous, some determined.

  “I copy, we’re going to the birds now.” Dougs said.

  “Good luck Captain.” Mosi said and the phone switch off. Richard broke the silence.

  “You think it’s your vulture?”

  “What else?” Erik said. Dougs merely gave them a wave as he started walking to his bck jet. With those fihe beak painted yellow, the two red eyes, it really was a beautiful mae. He hated the unfortable seat, he hated the fact he had to step on the body of the pne because no dder would curve like that to give access to the cockpit, he hated that heater did not work, the microphones, he hated how much the shook and how the engines sounded as if they were about to explode until they warmed up.

  And he wouldn’t trade Raptor One for any other bird out there.

  The engineers must have gotten the orders before he did, because they were all already clearing the runway. The fresh-meat was retreating back to their caravans. And Dougs finished his cigarette as he pulled the jumpsuit over himself. That was another perk of being a Raptor pilot, he had aire team just to make sure that everything was in pce for him and that he could get into the air as soon as possible. Dougs climbed onto the dder. He cmbered over the sleek bck hull and fell into the seat. That was holy the best way to do it, trying to do it with any dignity usually resulted in falling off the pself.

  Pistons hissed as men got out the way, one man with a pair of green lights in his hands rushed to indicate the way for Dougs. Holy, there was no hese military airstrips had so little traffic that usually, Dougs only preteo watch that man. And then, it was only insofar that he wouldn’t be ran over whe was setting off. “Captain Dougs. Your co-ordinates are already inputted into your radar.” The speakers said through his helmet. “Ammunition and fuel are both at maximum capacity. You’re clear for takeoff.”

  Dougs was already reversing Raptor Oo the runway by the time the speakers finished. Raptor One may have cked any amenities in life, but it had not given them up for no gain. The eurned on immediately, the lights didn’t even have a moment of preparation before they started responding. Everything flicked on immediately, even that terrible heater went from zero to a hundred in a matter of moments as it started bsting hot air into the cockpit.

  Dougs flicked the ignition button to his side. Botton engines, built into the side of the pop engines, fixed to the jet’s rear. O of fire sounded. Another did too. He felt the force of acceleration force him deeper into the barrel seat. Raptor Oarted to howl, a mere moment after he fired up the jets, the pne was already arg away from the ground.

  In a few moments, Raptor Ohe runway of Airstrip Six. In the few moments, Raptor Two caught up as blue fme blurred from its rear. Dougs was not about to let Erik get there first. These missions were always the best, the moment ammunition was expended, he would get an order to return. That could be achieved in only a few long flyovers, a matter of minutes. And then he could take a rest from swimming in the light blue o of the sky.

  The Ttors built up speed. The men piloting each vehicle practically mirrored each other. Big switch covered by a cap on the left, above the ammunition gauge. Flip it open, hold the accelerator, press it down. Fuel burst through the ehe blue fmes of the jets exploded into great fgrations e, then simmered back down into long trails of blue. Raptor One and Raptor Two both unleashed sonis as they broke the sound barrier. Behind them, more fighters were rising into the air from Airstrip Six.

  The ttors dashed through the sky like two bck bolts of lightning. Like two bolts shot out of the a Divine’s Crossbow, they devoured the distaween Airstrip Six and Jungle Group tre in a matter of minutes. Although the fact that the Airstrip was built specifically to be close to the frontlines did help. Frankly, Dougs wished they could have remained s through the air forever.

  The Vulture was the first thing that came into sight, high in the air. Almost as high as Raptor One was, Dougs made sure to angle his jet slightly higher up. If there was ohing he didn’t want dropping from above him. It was that giant bird. Dougs narrowed his eyes as he looked at the avian drop something. Regur, with a tube. Wheels. A Lemur. Aire heavy artillery piece, carried off with just one cw. The bird turhose red eyes towards Dougs. It shrieked. Frankly, Dougs breathed a sigh of relief the gss of his cockpit did not crack, but he wouldn’t have been surprised a si if it did.

  All thought of sweeping in with the gu his mind. This pass would be to simply see. And already, that vulture roving itself to be a hard target. It soared from side to side like a fly, seemingly being able to turn on a dime it cried out a deafening squawk again.

  And as Dougs dashed towards the horizon, he saw the other two. A lion, a crocodile, both built like cliffs. Eae was as big as a rge hill. The Lion stood taller as it smashed its cw down upon a battery of retreating Lemur artilleries. It crushed steel barrel and chassis and suffocated the rea of exploding ammunition as if it was merely spshing that paw into a puddle. A cloud of dust burst up from around it, as that golden lion, its mane a whirlwind ht fur, looked up and roarer. Dougs felt himself needing to keep the peady uhe sheer strain of that bestial roar.

  And then the Crocodile. A massive movi of carapace scales, eae se the gaps between them looked like small ravines. It, like the Vulture, was surprisingly fast. It moved like a tiny crocodile, ung itself from spot to spot as other artillery teams were trying to shell it and the Lion. That monster got hit high explosive rounds, those exploded against the beast’s fur and skin and… Dougs blinked as he ied the damage. And a small graze as if the Lion had just rubbed itself on the wall. At least it turned around to i its own wound. That was better than the Crocodile though. That was busy jumping from spot to spot, the ground shaking and booming and throwing up a sandstorm of red dust each time it did, and it didn’t eveo notice the torrent of shells impag its scales. The volley brought napalm. The shells exploded against the animal’s back, they threw that sticky jelly about, it started to burn a horrible smoke so dark it may as well have been tar, and the Crocodile did not even turn its head to i what was tig it.

  And Dougs saw this part of Jungle Group tre. What remained of it anyway. Men were running on the ground, bck clothes bringing trast against the red dirt of Kirinyaa. Cars and trucks and jeeps were all driving away, as were the Lemurs. Everything was going at a slightly different direct, there wasn’t even a single pair of vehicles that had formed. Not good. That meant the ander didn’t even think he could get away with losses, and was simply trying to minimize instead of avoiding them ht. Those that didn’t make it had been squashed into the ground, in the same fashion that a man stepping on a could ftten it, so did these monsters ftten artillery vehicles that weighed almost triple digits in tons.

  Captain Dougs braced into his seat again as he flipped the pne upside for o look. The giant Lion was staring up at them, the crocodile was moving back towards the Juself as its back was afme with napalm. That didn’t eveo tickle the beast. And that Vulture disappeared behind them as it swung its wings. Something that huge should not be that agile, but at least it wasn’t fast. Raptor One and Raptor Two both could put enough distaween themselves and the bird that it wouldn’t immediately peck them out of the sky with that tremendous beak. “Hey Erik?” Dougs said.

  “What?” Erik replied as the started to circle high above. That vulture gave up its chase auro the ground, fttening trees like bdes of grass once again.

  “So those patterns we saw st time.” Dougs began. “The circle where the lion.” The footsteps of that gigantic cat. That made sehe thick straight line is the crocodile.” That made seoo, the crocodile was wider than the lion, and it left a straight scar through the Jungle as it walked. “The vulture doesn’t leave a mark.” That thing flew, so of course it wouldn’t.

  “Oh.” Erik caught on. “Yeah, I see it.”

  “Do you?” Dougs asked.

  Erik voiced the words Dougs did not want to. “Where’s whatever made thin winding trail back then?”