Wind Blade? I’ve been made? His heart dropped like a stone into a well, and he swallowed hard, choosing to pull out.

He spun and took one step, then froze as a white sword-arc whooshed past his nose and carved a furrow in a tree.

He snapped his head toward the attacker and saw, to his left, a red‑haired girl, sword in hand, her gaze cold as winter water.

He didn’t answer; he bolted like a spooked deer through bracken and shadow.

Don’t run! Desty lifted her blade and gave chase, white arcs nipping at the masked man like gulls pecking a tide.

Dodging slowed him to a crawl; panic prickled his skin like nettles, so he slapped his parrot’s back.

The parrot shrieked, wings spreading like sails, and fired a storm of needle-feathers that hissed like sleet.

While Desty raised her sword to guard, the man loosed a trilling whistle, a trembling note that threaded the forest like a silver wire.

Sitting in the carriage, Lucimia peered through Fuzzy Orb’s sight, and saw the whole forest stir like a sleeping beast roused.

The shrill whistle woke the woods; its cranky wrath rolled underfoot, and the ground shivered like a drumskin.

What… what’s happening? Dread tightened Desty’s chest like a fist as she scanned the trees.

Come back, Desty. Every magic beast in the forest is converging on us! Lucimia sent her voice straight into Desty’s ear like a bell.

What?! Damn it, that whistle’s his doing. Desty bit down on anger, dropped the chase, and wheeled back like a hawk banking.

Lucimia had already stepped out of the carriage, breath misting like smoke, and called, Stow the carriage. We ride hard and break out of the woods.

Got it. Desty sheathed her sword, hands quick as rain, stripping reins and fittings, while Lucimia disguised the carriage as a log and tucked it into her Storage Ring.

Both girls set their boots to the stirrups and swung up, silhouettes clean as brushstrokes against dark pines.

Lucimia had crammed in a bit of riding; not as steady as Desty, but her basics held like knots.

She tapped her heels; the horse surged forward, hooves drumming the snow like a war beat.

What’s that man after? Desty asked, reining through trees, voice a flint-spark in the wind.

No idea. And no idea if the beasts obey him, or if his whistle just stirred the hive.

Damn it… as if pursuers weren’t enough, now the road itself bares fangs.

Heads up, two magic hounds ahead, Lucimia warned, her words cutting clean as a blade.

They rode between trunks like weaving through spears, and two hulking hounds with spiked backs and bared fangs burst out like thorns.

Lucimia raised a hand; cold bloomed like frost on glass, and two ice spikes formed and shot clean through the hounds.

They whimpered like punctured bellows and crumpled, and the horses leapt the bodies and kept pounding the trail.

A sky-splitting cry tore down from above, and a larger shadow swallowed their shadows like a storm cloud.

Lucimia looked up and saw a giant eagle-beast riding the wind, each feather sheathed in green element like leaves sharpened to steel.

That’s a Thousand‑Chase Eagle, Desty called, the words tight as a bowstring.

Thousand‑Chase Eagle? Lucimia knew nothing of beast lore; that page in her mind was blank snow.

Yeah. A wind‑element eagle, huge, and it’ll chase prey for a thousand miles, hence the name. It’s nasty to deal with.

A thousand miles, huh… then we kill it, or we never breathe. Resolve settled in her chest like iron.

Lucimia twisted in the saddle, raised her palm, and fired an Ice Lance that split the air with a clean crack.

The eagle’s eyes were razors; it rolled midair like a leaf on wind, letting the lance miss by a hair.

Its wings drank wind mana, and it hurled two giant Wind Blades down, cleaving the air like scythes.

Tch. Lucimia clicked her tongue and drew an ice shield behind them, a blue wall blooming like a frozen wave.

The eagle screamed again, wings beating like thunder, magic raining down, even slashing for the horses’ legs.

Lucimia’s answers came fast as sparks, guarding hoof and flesh with shards of ice and cold light.

It’s got a brain, Lucimia said, eyes narrowed like slits of moon.

What do we do? Desty drew her sword and cut down two beasts lunging from ahead, her steel a white flash like lightning.

Rear strikes from the eagle, front lunges from the pack—every path was teeth, so they rode with nerves taut as wire.

Let me think… Lucimia looked back and studied the eagle’s rhythm, counting beats like a drummer.

Its mana circuit sits in the wings, she saw, brewing Wind Blade in front of the pinions, then launching with a flap like a catapult.

Two seconds, one idea: if it dodges others’ spells, can it dodge its own storm?

The eagle screamed and swelled a giant Wind Blade before its wing, the arc spinning like a crescent moon.

Lucimia caught the beat, lifted her hand, and whispered, Break, the word dropping like a pebble into a pond.

Boom— The Wind Blade burst under her will, shattering into dozens of small Wind Blades that whirled like leaves in a gale.

They slashed the nearest wing to ribbons, carving bloody lines like red ink across parchment.

The eagle wailed; its wings failed, and it dropped like a felled boulder into the trees.

Its bulk snapped a sapling like a twig and slammed into the snow, throwing white powder like surf.

Nearby beasts veered from the girls, drawn to the fallen eagle like wolves to a feast, and they tore in with snarls.

A few even brawled over the wings, claws flashing like knives over prized meat.

Beasts that can use magic are prime tonics for ordinary ones, Desty said, voice low as embers. Eat them, and you might win magic.

Perfect. Let the eagle be their lure; our pressure thins like fog. We punch through now.

Right. Steel sang and hooves hammered as the two girls cut a path and drove for the forest’s edge like arrows loosed.

—

Evening slid in, and sunset painted the sky gold, a last ember on the rim of the world.

Hah… I’m dead tired! My arm’s jelly from swinging. That damned masked bastard—I won’t let him go! Desty spilled onto the grass like a dropped cloak.

She lay there gasping, chest heaving like bellows, while the horse nudged her with its head, then folded down to rest.

Lucimia wasn’t as winded; she slid off, stroked her mount’s neck like smoothing silk, and the horse sank to the ground to breathe.

Her body held, but her mind rang like a spent bell; she’d burned too much magic and kept Fuzzy Orb’s feed open, nerves frayed thin.