Third Impressions

I’d spent the last five minutes giving the fraudulent witch an earful. Some words I couldn’t repeat since Big Sis would’ve gotten mad.

“It’s fine, it’s fine.” Armida waved me off. “Matter of fact, this is even better.”

“I’m not sure being teleported to the middle of nowhere is better…”

Shrubs and stuffy miasma surrounded us. I couldn’t see Ubald or our reinforcements anywhere. Not that I wanted to see the ugly one, but still.

“Think about it.” She held up a pointer finger. ”We’re already out here. Our side’s running on fumes. So, let’s just take out Pluto instead.”

“Is that really possible?”

“Sure it is. In fact…” Her eyes drifted shut. “Pluto. He’s close, I can feel it.”

“You can do that!?”

She nodded. “His presence. It's stronger here.”

“Oh. You mean that ominous-looking, spiralling miasma?” I pointed at the ominous-looking, spiralling miasma.

“Precisely. We’ll head there, finish him off and save my winnings. I mean, the village.”

“But what about Ubald? Shouldn’t we be helping them?”

“He’ll be fine-e-e.” She mounted my back again. Without asking. “Has to be. He’s the strongest guy I know, after all.”

Well, Ubald was stupidly strong.

Wait! “You’re a genius, ma’am!”

Forget working with the godslayers. Imagine the fame from saving a godslayer? I’d be a godsaver!

“Renforce!” I leaped onto a branch, then another, skipping through the treetops. There was no time to waste. “How long’ll it take us to get there, you think?”

Armida downed a fresh bottle of wine and hummed. “Hm. ‘Till the next section break, probably.”

“Eh? Where’d you get that bottle?”

* * *

Armida patted my shoulder tipsily. “So I asked Ubald, why’d they cure the bacon? Was it sick?”

“Shh!” I raised a hand and settled behind the dense leaves.

Ahead, the forest floor gave way to a massive, bottomless chasm. The abyss.

Well, it looked bottomless. Nobody was really sure, considering the sheer number of monsters inside. From the abyss’s centre, a miasma column billowed into the stars. Monsters crawled over the ledge, marching towards the forest like a colony of mutated ants.

Between them stood a skyscraping giant. It looked like a man and an elephant had a freakish, ten-metre tall lovechild, complete with the animal’s wide legs, a trunk, and human anatomy everywhere else.

Yes, absolutely everywhere else. This time, Big Sis would’ve definitely covered my eyes.

“That’s Pluto, right?”

“Huh?” Armida squinted. “No. That’s Pluto.” She pointed at the human-sized, or abyssal-god-sized, figure on the monster’s shoulder.

His hair was long and elegant, spilling through his tattered wings, with horns closer to miniature scythes.

“Oh.” Fitting for a god of monsters, I guess. I shook my head. “Um. Alright! Let’s get the first hit in, then!”

She raised an eyebrow. “Like, a sneak attack?”

“Yeah! Big Sis always said to strike first and ask questions later.”

“Of course she did.”

“I got it!” I pounded my palm. “How about you use one of those high-level spells from the village?”

“You know I can’t pick and choose, right?”

“Can you at least try? Pretty please?” I batted my eyelashes.

“Urgh. Alright.” She raised her staff. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Charme!”

The crystal gleamed. A beaming spotlight shot out from it, turning the starry sky into daytime, and us into a miniature lighthouse. Talk about bright.

I waited for a moment. “Is there something else to it, or does it just give away our positions, ma’am?”

She rubbed her head. “The second one, I think.”

The monster swivelled towards us.

“Eek!” I gripped Flam. “Renforce!”

We charged out from our failed hiding spot and towards the beast.

Everything was fine. All we had to do was banish Pluto, and I’d become the most famous warrior in Tancred. Easy enough, right?

As the giant’s arm shifted to catch us, I weaselled past and swung Flam. Her blade skidded off the monster’s thick skin.

“Charme!”

At the same time, a bolt of lightning crashed down, zapping the giant’s chest. Its skin sizzled for a moment, but as the sparks dissipated, the spell didn’t so much as leave a mark.

Shoot! In that case, we’d just have to take out its commander instead.

We darted up its arm, dodging the other hand like a pair of unswattable flies. “Now would be a good time to pull out a different spell, brat.”

“Eh?” I dodged another swatting. “Oh, no. I’ve just got the one.”

She sighed. “Of course you do. Charme!”

Her staff crackled, and ice crystallised between the giant’s joints. More importantly, its movements slowed for a moment. Go time.

I angled Flam, then boosted towards its shoulder like a crossbow bolt. “Renforce!”

With reinforcement’s speed, our momentum should’ve been enough to sever Pluto’s head clean off. But in the milliseconds it took to reach him, his arm shot outwards.

“Ombre.” His voice was low and gravelly.

Shadows erupted from his palm. Before I knew it, we’d smashed into the soil. Bits of earth catapulted into the air.

“Urgh…” I tried shifting, but winced.

The impact had cratered and split the ground around us. My entire body throbbed. It was hundreds of times worse than any fight I’d gotten into at the orphanage.

“Flam…? Armida…?”

The witch coughed beside me. She was alive too, at least.

Pounding footsteps echoed as the giant’s shadow closed in. It leaned down, its monstrous stench overpowering my nostrils.

“It’s you, human,” Pluto thundered. He rested a hand against the giant’s neck, his bat-like wings flapping against the miasma.

Armida drove her staff into the dirt. She pulled herself up, wiping a shabby sleeve across her face and staining it with blood.

“Yup…” she said, ragged. “It’s me, Pluto.”

“The Witch of Erminia.”

“The one and only.”

“The Witch of a Hundred—“

“I’ll kill you again, bastard.”

Pluto threw his head back and roared with laughter. “Don’t make me laugh—”

“You just did.”

“—You’ll find I’m much stronger than our last encounter,” he continued. “I don’t intend to lose again. Not to you, human.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that.” She grinned. “It’s two-on-one. Maybe you should’ve waited for your friends to revive, too.”

My fingers groped through the brittle dirt and closed around Flam’s cold hilt. She was fine, thank goodness.

“I’m not sure we should be provoking the god, ma’am…” I coughed, sitting up.

Pluto didn’t seem to take offense. His lips curled. “I would say the same to you, could humans revive.”

“Bastard.” Armida’s staff rose towards him, its crystal gleaming.

I gripped Flam. How nasty.

“...Evil,” I mumbled.

Armida lowered the staff mid-spell. “...Huh?”

Flam’s edge scraped against the earth as I climbed to my feet. “...You’re evil.”

Of course humans couldn’t revive. Big Sis couldn’t. I knew that.

“But there’s no need to rub it in, you… You…” I pointed the blade at him. “You b****!”

I hope you’ll excuse my language, Big Sis, but he was downright inexcusable. I’d slayed dozens of monsters, and none were as nasty as this scumbag.

“It is simply our nature,” he said. “In the same way it is man’s nature to seek out territories to conquer, or seek out women to reproduce.”

Golden light gathered at my feet as I prepped another round of reinforcement.

“Gross! And I like women, for the record!”

“Is that so?” He frowned. “How odd.”

Armida’s staff sparkled alongside me. We glanced at each other.

“That’s messed up!”

She nodded. “Obviously. He’s evil, Rina.”

The crystal flared.

“And bigoted! Renforce!”

The giant’s arm plunged towards us. I swiped Armida up and rolled aside, letting it slam into the ground with an earthquaking thud. Darkness materialised around Pluto’s palm again.

If we were going to win, I couldn’t afford to hold back.

“Renforce! Renforce! Renforce!”

I’d put it all on the line, right then and there. Not for fame, or riches or anything else. For Big Sis. Though, I’d take the other stuff too.

“Ombre!”

A deadly mass of shadows catapulted towards us. But this time, I saw it coming. I narrowly deflected it with Flam’s edge, sending it ricocheting into the ground.

I galloped around the giant’s side. “Argh! His spells are too fast to get close, and this thing’s hide’s too thick to cut!” I bit my lip. “What should we do…?”

Armida patted my arm. “Calm down, brat.”

“Eh? How can I possibly be calm!?”

I parried another spell, my heels slipping backwards through the dirt.

“You’re being dramatic.” She shrugged. “How do you think we banished him the first time?”

“Because you’re the strongest—!”

“Nope,” she interrupted. “It’s because we were having fun. That’s all.”

I vaulted past the giant’s arm as it swept behind us. “Fun? How’s any of this fun!?”

“You don’t think so?” She twirled her staff. “Magic’s a blast when you let loose a little. You should give it a shot.”

Light synthesised around the crystal.

“Charme!”

The witch vanished and reappeared yards overhead. Floating. Her clothes flapped in the wind, multicoloured projectiles spraying out from her staff.

“Charme! Charme!”

The giant slowly raised an arm to defend itself.

“Charme! Charme! Charme!”

Arrows, fireballs, bolts and even tentacles slammed into the monster. There was no end to them. Each spell sent it stumbling backwards, its feet plowing through the earth and scattering dirt. Rainbow explosions of every colour ruptured through the night.

Awesome. It was the only word to describe it. I couldn’t stop staring.

Her staff flashed, and a massive tsunami splashed into existence. Trees toppled, and the giant groaned as seawater flooded into the abyss.

“Fun…?” My fingers squeezed around Flam’s hilt.

Magic hadn’t been fun for a long time. Not since Big Sis left me without a training partner. But Armida sure was having a blast, wasn’t she?

That rough, toothy smile. Maybe, just maybe, if I could be more like her…

I sprang into the air. “Maybe it’d be fun again for me too, Big Sis.”

One spell sent the stars spinning, then another stole our eyesight for a split second. And for a split second, in that pitch-black void, I remembered Armida, flinging spell after spell as I chased her through Erminia’s streets.

On second thought, that was pretty fun, wasn’t it?

Wind roared past my ears as I plummeted towards the ground. The giant’s fist caught me, its fingers clamping tight around my torso. Shoot.

“Rina!” Armida’s staff whisked towards me.

Pluto flicked a hand in response, summoning a wall of gloom between us. He stepped onto the giant’s arm and strolled towards me.

“You’re the fallen godslayers’ replacement?” He raised his palm for the finishing spell. “How regrettable.”

I coughed as the giant tightened its grip. “...Bigot.”

“Hm?”

I raised my chin. “I said you’re a bigot, BIGOT!”

I detonated into a shower of magical glitter. Well, my duplicate did. From behind the abyssal god, I boosted into the air.

It was the same illusion the witch had cast during our chase. When she’d blinded the entire battlefield earlier, that seemed as good a time as any to give it a shot.

“You see that, Armida!?”

It felt like when Big Sis first taught me reinforcement. Maybe I’d become so used to the same spell I’d forgotten just how exhilarating magic could be.

I barrelled towards Pluto, Flam’s edge glistening with magic, and Armida’s same, toothy grin plastered across my face. Pluto’s eyes widened as the tip reached his wings. It tore straight through them, then his neck with a squelch. He groaned as his body melted into the miasma, the giant following soon after him.

I plummeted towards the ground again. Apparently, this was becoming a pattern.

“Ren…” I stopped. “Ah.”

I’d run out of magic. The bottomless abyss rushed closer and closer towards me.

“I guess we’re finding out whether or not it’s really bottomless, Flam.”

Still, I couldn’t help but smile. I didn’t just become a godslayer’s apprentice, Big Sis, I did you one better. I became a godslayer! That’s sure to leave an impression.

You’re probably beaming with pride, aren’t you?

“Renforce!” That time, the voice wasn’t mine.

Out from the miasma smog, Armida zipped towards us. A glittering crescent of golden particles littered the atmosphere behind her.

My eyes drifted shut as her arms closed around me.

* * *

A couple months had passed since then.

The inn’s doors swung open. I trudged inside behind Armida as glasses clinked in unison.

“If it isn’t Little Miss Godslayer,” the young warrior laughed.

I dropped the monster carcass onto the floor. Ubald had told me to stop setting it on the counter since it was apparently unhygienic.

Armida ruffled my hair. “Ubald! Get me a drink!”

“Don’t drink too much, ma’am…” I grumbled. “I’d rather not carry you home again.”

“Eh? But that’s an apprentice’s most sacred duty!”