9. By Myself (Patreon)

"I'm sorry, Uma."

"You've done nothing wrong, Minerva."

"I'm sorry. I'm such a coward."

The wind whips through my hair, the green ribbons on my outfit snapping and thrashing against the current. I grit my teeth, holding Veritas tight in the fear that she will leap out of my grasp and return to the fight the moment I give her a chance. Really, though, I should trust her more. She's my teammate, and she agreed to retreat on my order. I shouldn't think of her as a liar. She's not one.

She's not happy with me, though. I'm not happy with myself.

I panicked. I lost control. And maybe I was right to panic, because that woman was stronger than Fulgora and I don't even know if she was transformed. I know red magic, I know anger, and the amount of it rolling off of her made it impossible for me to imagine victory. But what good am I, if I can't face up to impossible odds? That's what we are. Earth Guardians. The first, last, and only line of defense our world has against every other. I'm one of the oldest and most experienced among all of us, so why am I so weak?

Aurora glances up with a concerned look on her face, already sensitive enough to the fluctuations of magic to get a general read on my mental state. She's a prodigy, a truly exceptional warrior. I have to protect her, both for her sake and the world's. She's going to be so much stronger than me one day, though the thought fills me with as much inadequacy as it does hope. I'm going to get her killed. I'm not fit to be a leader. I shouldn't have a team at all.

And yet, things have gotten so bad that Uma'tama doesn't really have any other options.

"You said that if one of the Monster Queens entered the fight, you'd stall them long enough for us to complete the objective," Veritas accuses.

"Yeah," I agree. I did say that.

"We almost had it," Veritas insists.

"Yeah," I agree again.

"Veritas, leave her alone," Aurora says gently.

"But she—"

"You both did well," I say, cutting her off. "Veritas is right. I failed at my role. I panicked, and it prevented us from completing the mission. This was my fault."

Objectively, I know that just because the red mage is more powerful than I am, that doesn't mean the engagement was an automatic loss. My goal wasn't even to defeat her, only to delay her long enough for the other girls to finish their job. But I panicked, just like I did that day. Maybe I should just be thankful everyone is still alive.

"It wasn't a complete failure," Uma'tama projects into our ears. "We have learned quite a bit about our enemies today, and we managed to gain enough readings from the fight to be confident that we are at least not caught in the worst-case scenario. That artifact was impressively dangerous, but we are now confident that it poses no existential threat to the stability of your universe, at least not outside the normal risk for artifacts."

"Well, that's good!" Aurora says, trying to brighten the mood. "And since the Witches of Darkness have been sticking around our town for so long, I'm sure we'll get another chance to take them down!"

"Exactly our thoughts!" Uma'tama agrees. "Your targets today have traditionally kept out of the limelight, bringing artifacts to Earth and giving them to humans to cause havoc by proxy. Whether they keep that humanoid artifact or give it away to some criminal, we will have more opportunities to capture it and prevent any more harm."

"We could have captured it today," Veritas complains.

"Perhaps, but don't forget that your team just had to bail you out of getting captured the other day, Veritas. We think you should trust your team more when it comes to judging what is and isn't a winnable fight. The mindless monsters that emerge from the Dark World must be taken down immediately, so we understand that you are used to fighting hard until victory is achieved. But whatever plan the Corrupted have, it is clearly more long-term than a mindless slaughter of innocents. We cannot rush our engagements against them, lest we rush into a trap."

"Corrupted?" I ask.

"Yes, well, we heard you all arguing over what to name them on your flight over, so we figured we would share our name for them. As you know, engagements within the Dark World must be kept as brief and infrequent as possible, due to the dangers of the miasma. Your enemies today are why this rule exists."

"Wait, are you saying that they're magical girls?" Aurora asks.

"Yes," Uma'tama answers seriously. "They are former comrades of yours, but they have given up their duty and succumbed to the hatred of the Antipathy. We do not know their objectives, but their hatred for us borders on madness. As an Earth Guardian gets older, they become more powerful, but their resistance to the miasma lessens. The Corrupted are a group of four girls whom we have inexcusably failed to protect—Anath, Nanaya, Amalthea, and Melpomene. They are extremely dangerous, possessing all the powers they held as Earth Guardians in addition to whatever dark gifts the lingering will of the Antipathy has granted them."

"They look like they're turning into monsters," Veritas says quietly.

"They do indeed," Uma'tama agrees. "And perhaps that is exactly what is happening. We fear that one day, that transformation will consume them completely, and there will be nothing left of the human mind they once possessed. We wish to save them, if at all possible, but we do not understand the Dark World well enough to understand if their condition is reversible."

"You think they're going to slowly experience ego death?" I ask, faintly horrified.

"We do not know, but the evidence points that way. The monsters infesting the Dark World did not exist before their great execration, when that universe was still whole. We believe, therefore, that the monsters were the former plants and animals of the Dark World, and perhaps even all that is left of the Antipathy themselves."

I grimace. I was afraid it would be something like that. No wonder Anath has been getting more and more unhinged every time she comes after me. At least there are only four of them, and if they're former magical girls then I should at least be able to pull up records of their skills and fighting styles. I can prepare, at least. I don't know if it will be enough to overcome the power difference, but I have to try.

Even Veritas' irritation sobers a little after that conversation, and we spend the rest of the flight back to base in silence. The aftermath of a mission is often like this, the exhaustion catching up with us in the moments before we have to somehow return to civilian life. It's not even lunchtime yet, not that I had the opportunity to eat breakfast. Before I know it, I've gone through the motions, walking back out onto the streets of my hometown as my incarnate form sloughs off of me like blood in the shower. Now human again, I have nothing else to do but walk to school.

I remember when I first became an Earth Guardian. It was exciting, in a way, to so often sneak out of class and fight monsters, keeping my secret identity close to my chest as I tried to balance my responsibilities to the world with my responsibilities as an individual. But it wasn't long before I started drifting away from my friends, unable to give them satisfying explanations for all the promises I couldn't keep, for all the classes I had to miss, for the times I would come back limping without an injury to make up an excuse for. I don't even know why I go to school, sometimes. Am I just going to retire like Castalia? I may have gotten accepted to college somehow, but I can't even imagine it. I'm honestly shocked that I'm going to graduate high school this year. I don't feel like I've earned it, with how my grades barely scrape by, often just a little higher than they probably should be. It's sort of obvious that I'm one of the local magical girls. Nobody talks to me about it—I wouldn't tell them anything if they did—but most people in my grade still treat me with that mix of pity and awe that's just a little too condescending to ignore.

What do my teachers think I'm going to do if they fail me? Are they afraid I'll blow up their house? Earth Guardians don't do that. Maybe they just don't want to be the person holding back the hero who keeps their children alive from graduating. It's weird to me. Those two things aren't related. Even if I dropped out of high school, it's not like I'd stop being an Earth Guardian. School is just the thing I do when there aren't any monsters to destroy.

By the time I make it to school the cafeteria is open, so I limp my way inside, the compounded injuries from both Minerva and Fulgora aching deeply inside my soul. Aurora is a great healer, but magical healing isn't quite as magical as I'd like it to be. It works more like a shot of adrenaline, which to an incarnate form can actively, physically repair it for a little while. But incarnate forms are strange, confusing things, as conceptual as they are physical, and for whatever reason they retain our physical human weaknesses when it comes to what we can and cannot walk off.

It's not like magic can't physically repair the injuries of the human body, but as far as I know there was only ever one Earth Guardian who managed it, and she is no longer with us.

"Oh! Eliza, hey!"

I glance over and spot Chloe waving at me as I get in the lunch line. I wave back, and after getting my food I limp over to her table and sit down.

"I, uh, noticed you weren't in class this morning, so I copied my notes for you," she says, handing me a stack of papers.

"Thanks," I nod at her, taking them and putting them in my backpack despite knowing that I will never once read them.

"Are you doing okay?" she asks hesitantly. "You were limping a lot."

I shrug, not really knowing what to say. Chloe is probably the closest thing I have to a friend, but she's not an Earth Guardian and I just don't have any idea how to articulate everything that happened to someone who wouldn't get it. Both of my fights today were on Earth, which means they almost certainly were on the news, and while I doubt Chloe would ever connect me to Minerva, she almost certainly knows that I am Fulgora. She's known for years, despite the fact that I've never told her.

"It looks worse than it is," I lie. "How are you doing? Things with Brian going okay?"

She groans and starts to regale me with her many relationship troubles. God, she could never be a magical girl. With how much she lets her emotions control her she'd probably blow herself up on the first day. I hum along with her story, giving her amicable nods and appropriate noises of sympathy as I mentally check on the carefully cultivated bundle of anger I keep simmering inside me. My fears float around it, unwanted but still managed by necessity. It churns like an engine, always idling so it can roar up to speed in an instant.

"You're not really listening, huh?" Chloe calls me out. "Sorry, I talk about myself too much. Do you have any fun plans for the summer?"

I turn to look at her, the anxiety wafting off of her marking her bright smile as fake.

"No, not really," I tell her.

"Well, we should hang out!" she insists. "I know you have a bit of an unpredictable schedule, but I'm flexible. We could go shopping, or see a movie, or hell, pretend to be older and get drunk if you want!"

That manages to make me snort with amusement.

"I don't think that last one is a good idea," I tell her. It would sort of be a public safety risk.

"So… you think the other ones are?" she presses, wiggling her eyebrows at me.

Oh, I see. She's trying to cheer me up. That's… really nice, actually.

"I guess if you're going to twist my arm about it," I smirk at her. "Sure. You pick the time and place, and then I probably won't show up."

"It's a date!" she declares. "Well, not like a date-date. I think I'm starting to figure out that's not really your thing."

I blink.

"Is it not?" I ask, slightly dumbfounded. "I guess I never really thought about it."

"Yeah, that's kinda why I don't think it's your thing," she shrugs. "A normal high schooler would be slobbering all over somebody by senior year, but I've never seen you check out even the hottest of hotties, and you've certainly never complained about being single."

"I try not to complain much in general," I tell her.

"I know, sweetie," she says, patting me on the shoulder. "That's why you need somebody like me to take care of you."

I flush a little, looking away with embarrassment.

"I really don't know why you put up with me," I admit. I feel like a complete dead fish in our friendship. Chloe is always doing nice stuff for me, but I barely even think about her outside of school. I'm a bad conversationalist and an awful friend; I just kill monsters. It's the only thing I'm good at.

"Well, somebody ought to," Chloe shrugs. "And hey, wouldn't you know it! I'm somebody! So there you go."

I chuckle, shaking my head. I wonder if I saved her life, or a member of her family. Am I a bad person for not remembering? I want to ask, but even though the divider between my human self and my secret identity is barely more than a shredded curtain, I just can't bring myself to do it.

"I wonder if that's why magical girls do it," Chloe continues, peeking through that curtain anyway. "Somebody has to, so how can you say no when you're the only one who can?"

I don't have any idea what to say to that, so I latch onto the first subject change I can think of.

"You really think I'm not interested in dating?" I ask.

"Uh, yeah, why? Is that a surprise to you?"

I mean, I just thought that I couldn't relate to anyone. It's kind of hard to get excited about movies and lunch dates and kisses when I'm staggering through the day because I can't stay asleep through the pain and dreams.

"Y'know, I actually just talked to my brother about this today?" I admit. "My whole life I've just taken for granted that I would be gay."

She snorts her drink out her nose and doubles over into laughter, startling me enough that I would have reflexively cast a shield spell if I was transformed.

"Oh my god, Eliza," she says. "I know you don't like to talk about it, but that makes it really obvious. You get that, right?"

Yeah. I get that. It's about the closest I can come to telling her the truth, even though she already knows.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I lie, taking a sip from my drink as I grab a few napkins to hand to her. Her laughing and coughing fit made quite a mess. She accepts them gratefully, wiping down the area in front of her. "You might be onto something about my romantic orientation, though. And maybe my sexual orientation, too? Damn, now I actually have to think about it."

Maybe that's why I don't feel uncomfortable in a child's body. It would be really fucking awkward to be Minerva if I was actually in a relationship with someone, but I don't want to be in a relationship in the first place, so I guess that isn't a big deal? I mean, it's still extremely weird and kind of creepy, but it's not like I'm doing it on purpose. It just… started happening one day.

It started happening because I had to say yes.

"Well, apologies for the sudden personal revelation, I suppose," Chloe says, still chuckling a little. "Or maybe 'you're welcome?' I honestly thought you knew."

"I mean, the more I think about it, the more I feel like I probably should've known," I admit, scrunching my eyebrows together. "Like just… huh. Yeah. It explains a lot."

It's a nice thing to know, assuming it's true. I kind of want it to be true. It feels like a weight off of my shoulders. I don't have to worry about finding a relationship that I've never really been interested in. It's not something that's wrong with me. It's not the trauma crushing my ability to care about people. It's not the nightmares, the anger, or the fear. It's not just another part of me that's broken.

I really, really want that to be true.

I glide through the rest of the day, school passing me by in flashes so brief and ephemeral that I may as well have not even shown up to class. My mind is too occupied by those corrupted magical girls and the threat they pose. I'm the oldest and most experienced Earth Guardian in the city. It's my job to keep everyone safe, to stop the monsters before they can hurt anyone innocent. Up until now, Melpomene's group has always been an enigmatic threat, a group of schemers that I would occasionally find at the end of a long trail, having already escaped before any real fight breaks out. Sometimes Anath would single me out and fight me, and I would kick her ass, and she'd run off. It was infuriating, but it never seemed like she was trying to kill me. 

Then, Uma'tama found new girls to empower. I was asked to lead and teach them against all good sense, and my transformations into Minerva started happening. I feel weaker now than ever before, my transformation stone muddying into a worthless brown. It's not unheard of for an Earth Guardian's transformation stone to change colors during a time of substantial emotional upheaval, but it's usually because the new emotion becomes so overwhelmingly dominant over her former primary emotion that it forces a restructuring in the crystal to match her new level of strength. For everyone else, it's a powerup, a moment of self-realization that allows a Guardian to transcend beyond their former self. But I didn't get that. I just got another self, one that makes me even more confused, and she makes both halves of me that much weaker.

I can't afford that anymore. I don't know if I was strong enough before Minerva to have stood a chance against that red mage, but I was definitely stronger than I am now. And I wouldn't have been such a coward, either. I would have been able to put my life on the line.

But it's not about my life. It wasn't just me that she was threatening, and I could never, ever, risk the life of those kids. Those were the stakes. That was my decision. I would die if it would save them, but would it have? No. 

…I shouldn't die for them anyway. Not if I can help it. They would never forgive me for that, and they would be right not to. No, the solution is the same as it has always been: I have to be stronger. And though I might be the most powerful Earth Guardian in town, it's only by technicality. The girl whose shoes I'm trying to fill is still here, isn't she? I don't want to bother her, but… at this point, I'm kind of desperate. 

After school, I wander onto the local college campus, heading for the dorms. I'm probably technically not supposed to be here, not yet being a college student and all, but nobody stops me because there is nothing weird about an eighteen-year-old girl walking around a college campus. I realize, as I walk up the stairs to Castalia's dorm, that I don't actually have any idea if she's going to be there. She could be in class, she could be in the library, or she could even be out enjoying the life she's earned for herself. I feel kind of stupid for not calling ahead, but instead of just sending her a text I continue over to her room and knock on the door. If she isn't home, I'll just leave. I don't want to interrupt her if she's actually out doing something.

Fortunately, I feel the hum of her magic as my fingers rap against the door, and soon enough the knob turns and pulls open to reveal her floating in front of me. Her blank face doesn't even twitch when she sees me, not a single emotion visible in either her blind or working eye. She lands on the ground, the door squeaking as it moves slowly under the effects of gravity, her telekinesis dropped.

"Come in," she invites me, her voice dry and raspy. I follow her inside and close the door for her, collapsing onto her ratty couch when she gestures for me to do so. Her living space is honestly kind of nice by college dorm standards, with a separate bathroom and a kitchenette built into the back wall. It suddenly feels a lot less nice when you realize that it's supposed to have two people in it, but for some reason the college has yet to assign Castalia a roommate. They're probably afraid to. I know I would be.

"You're injured," Castalia states.

"Yeah, I got pretty messed up. Nobody died, though."

She nods, heading back into her little kitchenette and clattering around in the sink for something.

"I was hoping I could get your advice for something," I tell her.

"I advise not meeting with me in your human form," Castalia says, rinsing off a plate. "It will compromise your identity. I don't really have anyone else coming to talk with me about things."

"My identity is more or less shot," I shrug. "It's an open secret."

"Mmm," Castalia hums disapprovingly. "Well, it's up to you. What did you want to ask?"

She puts something in the microwave as I try to figure out exactly how I want to word the question. It's fundamentally a very simple problem, it's just somewhat embarrassing to say. I'm sure it's a question Castalia has been asked a thousand times before, and if she could give an easy answer to it then I wouldn't even be in this mess. Still, I have to try.

"How am I supposed to replace you?" I ask.

The microwave beeps, and Castalia removes its contents, hovering over to me and pulling her knees up to her chest to float her feet over the back of the couch. She plops down on the cushion next to me, placing a cooked hot pocket on the end table in front of us.

"Want one?" she asks.

I sigh and wave her off, spreading my arms and legs out in a futile attempt to sink into the couch and disappear.

"I'm good," I tell her. She nods and begins to eat, gulping down large bites despite the rising steam and still-bubbling cheese. It's only when she finally finishes that she turns to me and acknowledges my question, albeit in her roundabout way.

"Can I see your transformation stone?" she asks.

If literally anyone else in the world asked me that, except maybe Uma'tama, I would refuse categorically. This stone isn't just mine, it's me. I am more Fulgora and even Minerva than I've ever been Eliza. Without it, I die. But I think Castalia understands that. After all, I don't even know the name she was given at birth. I don't know what she looks like outside of her scarred incarnate form. Even in retirement, she has kept her stone, because she is Castalia and no other.

So I pull the necklace up from underneath my bra and hold it out to her. Castalia's magic wraps gently around it, flowing through it the way water leaks through the ground. It's a terrifying thing to experience that much power moved so casually, pressed into something so close to my soul. My mind flashes back to that red healer, the sheer weight of the anger she put in the air. Why can't I do that? How can I not be angry enough, after everything that's happened?

"I'm surprised you can cast at all with this," Castalia says bluntly, dropping the stone back into my hand. "A red-green lattice is probably tied for the least efficient emotional transmuter possible. Fear and anger oppose each other magically. It's certainly not impossible to use well, but because the red parts don't work well with the green parts and vice versa, you're effectively fighting at half strength unless you are actively and directly using both emotions simultaneously. That will be… difficult to do reliably."

"I'm well aware," I frown. "I was hoping you'd have some idea of what to do about it."

Castalia nods, still hugging her knees as she rocks back and forth slightly on the couch, thinking quietly. I clasp my transformation stone back around my neck, the anxiety of it being anywhere else mercifully vanishing from my shoulders.

"You will have to do more with less," Castalia says. "In some ways, this might be a good thing for you. It's good training."

"What does that mean?" I ask. "How do I get more power out of less power?"

"Steadiness of thought. Better alignment between the source and output of your spells. Everything you cast should be everything you want at the moment of casting. That, more than pure strength of emotion, is what allows you to do what you are already doing. Your experience makes using that stone possible. Anyone can push themselves to feel more strongly. Instead, feel more completely."

But what if I can't seem to decide how I feel about anything? I'm constantly arguing with myself about everything I want. The only thing I know for sure is that I need to be stronger.

"That's easier said than done," I frown.

Castalia shrugs with the one shoulder that's still able.

"Isn't everything?"

The plate levitates itself off of the little end table, Castalia standing up to escort it back to the sink. I clench my fists, feeling like an idiot. 'That's easier said than done?' What a stupid thing to say. I'm just complaining about the problem instead of working towards solving it. I can't afford that kind of childishness. I couldn't even afford it when I was a child.

"What got you hurt so bad, by the way?" Castalia asks. "You're plenty strong enough to handle anything short of a kaiju by yourself."

"Uma'tama called them the Corrupted," I say, and then I leap to my feet as the sound of shattering china rings out through the room. The plate Castalia was carrying is on the floor, dropped like her spell completely fizzled out. She stares at it, the same lack of expression on her face as always, but anyone who thinks that Castalia retired because she burned her emotions out is a fool. The weight of her power is like swimming a hundred miles under the ocean, the pressure enough to crunch me like a soda can. I am lucky, I think, that Castalia is a yellow mage, someone who normally casts with joy or love. I suspect that if this was her element, my soul would have been splattered into dust.

And then, the feeling is gone.

"Oh," Castalia says, and then the fragments of the broken plate lift up off of the floor and fuse back together like nothing ever happened. She sets it carefully into the sink to soak under warm water, her back to me as she stares intensely at a random part of the kitchen.

"...I take it you're familiar with them, then," I say carefully.

"Yes," Castalia answers. "They are… dangerous."

"Whatever part of the Dark World they live in has been staying close to town for over a month now," I tell her. "Either that or they're constantly hopping into whatever chunk is closest."

"So you think you will need to fight them again," Castalia says, a small frown managing to make its way onto her face.

"Exactly," I say. "I'm an Earth Guardian. I can't allow myself to lose. It just isn't an option. You know that, right? That efficiency tip, it's good advice, and if that's all you can teach me then I'll happily take it. But it won't change anything. It won't be enough. There's only so far skill can take me, isn't there? Especially with a stone like mine. I feel like I'm up against a wall, something blocking me from going any further. But you've broken through that, haven't you? You've smashed those limits."

Castalia is quiet for a long time, a few more clanks in the kitchen accompanied by the sound of running water as Castalia uses her monster-annihilating magical power to do the dishes. I'm left there waiting for five, maybe ten minutes, but I don't complain. I don't really know Castalia all that well, except as the legend that she is. I was her junior for a little while, but we weren't on the same team and she never interacted with me much. She was already a mess of scars by the time I met her, and somehow she speaks a lot more now than she did back then. Still, I don't get the impression that she's ignoring me. I can be patient, if it means learning about power from someone like her.

Eventually, she finishes her chores and walks back to the couch, standing in front of me and staring rather than sitting down.

"Show me yourself, Fulgora," she says.

"Uh, I don't really wanna bleed all over your couch," I hedge. I don't really want to feel the full brunt of the pain from that body either, but that's a secondary concern.

"I can clean it," Castalia insists. "Show me."

I sigh, sitting up into something resembling proper posture before initiating my transformation. It hurts like a motherfucker, my shoulder badly broken and still weeping blood along with multiple smashed ribs, and I don't even know what kind of mess my gut is right now. My throat feels like burning blood, all iron and acid. Castalia regards my messed-up body with the same expression she always uses, kneeling down slightly and casting something that seems to tug my broken ribs around.

This makes everything substantially more painful.

"I saw you fight at Denver the other day," she says as I do my best to stoically choke down the whimpers and screams I want to let out. I'm pretty sure she's trying to heal me, but even if she's not I'm not really in a position to stop her. "You were strong. You did very well."

"I could barely even scratch that giant monster, and then you showed up and annihilated it in one shot," I remind her.

"Mmm. But that wasn't the only monster. It is my understanding that you took out over a hundred on your own, stopping the swarms from making progress as the other girls fought the kaiju."

"That's not enough," I say, gritting my teeth. "I should have been able to do more. I was older than all of those girls."

"But you knew your limits," Castalia says. "You knew exactly what you could and could not do, and as a consequence you made the biggest impact you could have. That is a rare skill. It will make you a very good leader."

I flinch. Are you kidding? I have no idea what I'm doing.

"At the end of the day, I still have to win," I insist. "It doesn't do anyone any good for me to know my limits if those limits aren't enough."

Another sharp surge of pain crashes through my body, and then Castalia's magic retreats. My injuries are all still there, blood seeping into the cushions. I think she probably just set my bones or something, to make recovery easier. I let go of my incarnate form, returning to human standard so that recovery can be done without losing quite as many fluids, and without quite as much pain.

"Thank you," I nod to her.

"If you want to break your limits, you'll have to break yourself."

I blink, a little caught off guard, but I force myself to think about that.

"I appreciate the advice, but what does that mean exactly?" I ask. "I feel pretty darn broken, physically speaking."

She sits down next to me and baps me in the face with her stub arm.

"Not advice," she says. "It's a warning. Train how the Preservers tell you to train. If you need more help, girls from other cities can help. You do not need to do everything on your own. You do not need to be me."

The TV remote lifts itself into the air and turns on some news channel, which I take to mean that the conversation is over. I rub my cheek where she smacked me, scowling a little as I think back to everything she said. I wasn't really expecting some sort of instant power-up trick or anything, but I was hoping for a little more than this. She's basically telling me to stop trying, to just keep doing what I've always done even though it isn't working. But I can't accept that. If I have to break myself to become strong enough, I will. It's not even a question. Of course, I still don't know what that even means, so it's not like I can just go do it—or even purposefully avoid it, if I was so inclined. I'm really just back to where I started, no closer or farther away from finding the answer than before.

That's fine. It was good just coming here, to remind myself that there is a way. Castalia could swat that red mage like a fly, and she doesn't need some kind of horrific dark transformation to do it. She's the strongest there is, and it's entirely her own power. That's what I want. That's what I need to find. I will never let anyone get hurt on my watch again.

"—the evacuation forecast for today," the newscaster announces, catching my attention. "As you can see, there have been multiple reports in the area between Fort Collins and Windsor that could potentially be a follow-up from the same pocket that attacked Denver a few days ago. Whether another giant monster will be appearing or not remains to be seen, but if nothing else this is shaping up to be a large Dark World presence and the evacuation zones shown here are likely to be in effect as early as one in the morning tomorrow. If you or anyone you know lives in these areas, you might want to consider staying with friends or family tonight, so there's no risk of a rude awakening if these projections turn out to be true."

I sigh and slowly get to my feet, stretching my sore body even though I know most of the pain isn't entirely real.

"Well, it looks like I should probably go take a nap before tonight," I announce.

"Looks like it," Castalia agrees. "Best of luck, Fulgora. Or… Minerva?"

I stiffen a little.

"I didn't know you knew," I admit.

She just responds with another half-shrug, levitating a bag of chips over and cradling it carefully between her knees. I shake my head, not entirely sure what I was expecting. It is Castalia, after all.

"Yeah, I'll probably be Minerva tonight, if only because Fulgora is still a mess," I confirm. "Thanks for your help, though."

"You are welcome to come back, if you wish," Castalia says. "I don't get many visitors."

"I'll see if I have time," I answer noncommittally, heading for the door. "Bye, Castalia. Thanks again."

"Mmm."

I exit and descend down the stairs, discontentment swirling in my chest as I make my way home. There is a way to get stronger. It's demonstrably possible. I just have to find it.

No one else is strong enough, so I don't have a choice.