An Ambush of Your Own Making

"Perla is still alive!"

A single name, a prayer of impossible hope, clawed its way from Cera’s throat amidst the pandemonium. That single realization was a catalyst, instantly transmuting the crushing anchor of her grief into a white-hot furnace of vengeance. A silent vow took root in the core of her being: These men will pay for what they have done.

The promise had barely finished crystallizing in her thoughts when a blinding, serrated agony ripped through her arm. An unseen third assailant, moving with a serpent’s swiftness, had exploited a momentary lapse in her guard. Cera spun to face him, her fury overriding the fiery protest of her wound as she clenched her teeth. She had already neutralized two others with ruthless precision. The first was met with a summoned sphere of fire that swallowed his head whole; the magic was so ferociously hot it stifled his scream before it could be born, cauterizing melting flesh in an instant. The other had been aiming a firearm when she had lunged, not to disarm, but to obliterate. Her hand, cloaked in an aura of flame, had simply enveloped the weapon, fusing metal and bone into a singular, grotesque sculpture of ruin.

Across the chaotic battlefield, the colossal figure of Cy rose to his full, intimidating height, a titan of retribution. His roar was a tectonic force that seemed to vibrate through the flagstones as he threw his hands toward the heavens. In answer to his summons, a barrage of fireballs descended from the sky—a cataclysmic meteor shower that rained down on a trio of charging soldiers, leaving behind only scorched earth and the smoldering husks of their armor. In the aftermath of that fiery spectacle, Red moved like a phantom. The poisoned shuriken he held fanned between his fingers were already in flight, their trajectory unerring. They found their marks in the necks and chests of his targets, who fell before they could even process his presence as a threat.

Elsewhere, Grimshaw and Krysta were entwined in a deadly ballet. The silvery crescent of her scythe sang through the air, missing his throat by a hair's breadth as he threw himself into a roll. He came up in a low crouch, chest heaving as he fought for breath.

A soft sigh parted Krysta's lips. "You're proving to be surprisingly resilient." A cruel smile curled the edge of her mouth as she straightened to her full height. "But I wonder, how will you contend with this?" From a pouch, she produced a small package wrapped in cloth.

Cera’s eyes widened, a knot of dread tightening in her stomach. Cy’s mouth fell agape.

With a motion full of dramatic flair, Krysta unfurled the fabric, revealing four small, cylindrical explosives. Her voice was laced with poison as she armed the first. "Grimshaw is the target—"

She was cut short. In a streak of movement that defied his exhaustion, Grimshaw launched himself toward her, casting aside all semblance of defense in a final, all-or-nothing gambit. The force of their collision sent the armed explosive skittering from her grasp. It struck the stone floor, and the impact shattered its delicate timing mechanism.

For a fraction of a second, the world ceased to exist, replaced by a silent, all-consuming flare of white light. The sound that came after was not a sound at all, but a physical concussion that tore through the very fabric of the air. Grimshaw was annihilated at the epicenter, but his final act was one of desperate, terrible purpose. He had poured the last dregs of his life force into the blast, weaponizing his own demise. His body became the bomb, a horrific projectile of blood and bone that showered a stunned Krysta from head to foot.

She stumbled backward, her expression of vicious triumph curdling into one of utter revulsion as she wiped his remains from her face. "Ghastly," she choked out. "If I'd known he would resort to that, I wouldn't have wasted my time."

"Grimshaw," Cera breathed, the name a reverent whisper. A silent prayer of thanks for his sacrifice formed in the quiet devastation of her heart, but it was immediately followed by a chilling realization. If he’s gone… then our link to the ghosts is severed!

"He's a ghost now!" Ventus’s shout cut through the ringing in Cera’s ears from several yards away. He sidestepped the lunge of a soldier with fluid grace, his own blade flashing out to cut the man down. "He can accomplish the mission that much faster. This must have been his plan from the start."

"Tch," Ignis grunted from the periphery of the fight. "The stories I know never painted Grimshaw as the self-sacrificing type."

Ventus shrugged, effortlessly evading another dagger strike and using his attacker’s own momentum to send him sprawling. "Everything is different when you love someone enough to make the ultimate sacrifice."

"A dangerous sentiment," Ignis observed quietly, his eyes fixed on the scene of destruction.

Krysta's disgust was swiftly boiling back into a burning rage. "It makes no difference," she growled, her hand reaching again for the cloth package. "I will simply try again!"

"He's certainly not rushing," Cera muttered to herself, her eyes darting through the chaos, searching for any sign of Grimshaw’s spectral return. "Any moment now…"

Just as Krysta’s fingers brushed against the second bomb, the atmosphere around her grew dense and frigid. A thick, ethereal mist materialized out of thin air, coiling around her limbs like spectral serpents. The suffocating grip of the dead descended, an otherworldly pressure that seemed to squeeze the very air from her lungs. Pure panic flared in her eyes. She clawed at her own throat, the unarmed explosive tumbling from her now-useless hand. Her lips peeled back from her teeth in a soundless shriek, her face twisting into a hideous mask of raw terror.

"You—" she rasped, the single word dripping with a mixture of disbelief and fury. "—dare attempt to possess me?"

In the space of a heartbeat, the spirits fell upon her. A vortex of gray and blue light engulfed Krysta's form as the newly spectral Grimshaw, Boris, and a legion of other ghosts merged with her. For the clan members still engaged in their own life-or-death struggles, she became a terrifying spectacle—a body contorting and writhing in the throes of an unseen war, fighting for dominion over her own soul.

Her cool brown eyes erupted in a frenzied storm of scarlet and purple. Then, just as suddenly, they reverted to their natural color. She spat a viscous glob of saliva and ectoplasm onto the stone.

"You honestly believed you could take me?" A wild, mirthless laugh tore from her throat. The ghosts had been utterly defeated, forcibly ejected by the sheer power of her will. "You are absolute, unequivocal fools! For that insult, I will ensure your deaths are drawn-out and excruciating." Her gaze swept the battlefield, dismissing the lesser warriors before it locked onto its primary objective. "You!" she screamed, and charged.

The gash in Cera's arm sent a fresh wave of agony up her limb, impeding her reaction time. There was no time to pull a nearby soldier into the path of the attack. She threw her body sideways just as the massive scythe scythed through the space she had occupied. As she rolled, she thrust her palm out, unleashing a jet of fire at Krysta’s feet—a feint meant to buy a precious second. Her next instinct was to conjure a torrent of flame and incinerate the woman where she stood, but a consuming need for understanding stayed her hand.

"Why, Krysta?" Cera's voice was a ragged cry. "What led you to this? What is the reason for this war?"

"Tch!" Krysta spat again. She let the butt of her scythe rest on the ground as she drew a lighter, faster blade from a sheath on her back. At her whispered command, her soldiers fell back, creating a wide circle around the two women. She lunged at Cera once more.

"Why?" Cera demanded again, her eyes wide with desperation as Krysta's blade carved the air dangerously close to her face. A sudden, powerful gust of wind—Ventus's intervention—slammed into Krysta, forcing her back and giving Cera a moment to breathe.

"Because I was able to," Krysta snarled, the answer a contemptuous dismissal of all logic.

"That's not an answer!" Cera shot back, her frustration boiling over. "There has to be a reason! Is there truly no purpose to any of this?"

"No," Krysta replied, her voice a chilling whisper in the abrupt silence. "But if you require a reason to cling to that pathetic life of yours, I suppose I can provide one." A hollow, bitter laugh escaped her lips. "You humans are so brittle. Always searching for a purpose. So dreadfully needy."

The wind, which had become a mournful gale, whipped strands of dark hair across Krysta's face. A translucent, gossamer fabric, like the echo of a dress, floated over the practical, form-fitting leotard beneath. In stark contrast, Cera’s own black tunic was a grim reminder of the master who had been mentor to them both. She stood with no weapon, save for the fire that coursed through her blood.

A deep crease formed between Cera’s brows, her contained rage radiating like a palpable heat. Krysta's expression was a mask of cold, glacial contempt.

Raising a hand to halt her advancing warriors, her earlier thirst for blood momentarily forgotten, Krysta seemed to embrace the role of a raconteur. "It started when I was just a girl," she began. "And do not feign ignorance. The rumors of my shame have spread so far and wide they might as well be branded on my skin." It was a flicker of vulnerability, a rare fissure in her hardened exterior. "The world would never have considered me a proper witch. Far from it. I could scarcely steer a broom, my incantations would sputter into nothing, and even the familiar I chose was the runt of its litter." She paused, her gaze drifting upward as if she were reliving the profound humiliation. "But I endured. Though I am from the south, I opened a small shop in a northern village. I managed to carve out a life for myself, selling trinkets and making small deliveries."

The story felt so mundane, so achingly normal. The stillness that had fallen over the battlefield was unnerving. A profound sense of unease settled over Cera. Even the weathered face of Jiro, one of Krysta's lieutenants, was an unreadable stone carving; the men encircling them were unnervingly silent.

Krysta spat the subsequent words as if they were poison. "One day, I took my broom and journeyed into the woods. There, I met an old friend from my childhood. In retrospect, I should have seen it. His entire disposition had shifted over the previous month, grown shadowed and grim."

As she spoke, her voice was a monotone, her eyes hollow, as if she were recounting the tale of a stranger who had perished in those woods long ago. Yet, a faint tremor in her hands, a nearly imperceptible quiver at the tip of her blade, spoke of a primal rage buried beneath the ice.

"He raped me."

The words dropped into an absolute, dead silence.

"That's… monstrous," Cera managed to say, a sudden tide of empathy momentarily quenching her own fury. "But what does that have to do with… any of this?"