CHAPTER 6 — The Triplets

The first missed attack violently tore the entire top off the heavy rock.Lya was already on her feet, fiercely pulling Soren behind her before the stone fragments had even finished falling around them."Move! This place is dead!""Wait, Lya—""Move, Soren!"They scrambled out of the narrow hollow and rushed down the steep slope. Without her noticing, the fighting on the island had drawn much closer. Now, the deafening explosions were coming from both sides of the forest at once, and the sky above the dense canopy had taken on a horrific color that belonged to no natural hour of the day.They rapidly rounded a cluster of thick trees. And two boys suddenly blocked their path.Lya stopped dead in her tracks. Right behind her, she heard the distinct crunch of sand.A third boy.She spun around instantly. They were completely surrounded, and all three attackers possessed exactly the same face.Three enemies. Three angles."Okay," Lya whispered, forcing her voice to remain steady. She pushed Soren firmly behind her shoulder. "We don't want to fight. We've got absolutely nothing against you guys. We're just looking for somewhere quiet. You can leave right now, and we'll pretend this encounter never happened."The triplets looked at one another in silence. It didn't last long—just long enough for Lya to understand that they shared a telepathic bond and didn't need to speak out loud to reach a deadly agreement.Then, all three smiled, with the exact same slight, unsettling delay."No."The assault started without any further warning.Three powerful jets of water shot out simultaneously from three completely different directions. Lya grabbed Soren by his collar, threw him flat to the ground, and covered the empty space above his body with a dense wall of water that took all three enemy attacks head-on.The defensive wall held. It held remarkably well, in fact, and that was what reassured her for one second too long.They're Squares. They only give things form, they don't actually compress them. As long as I maintain this block, we're safe.She rolled quickly to the side, pulled Soren up by his arm, and backed rapidly toward a solid boulder to protect their rear.However, the second assault didn't come from the front. It surged from below.The solid ground rose violently beneath her boots in a clean, sharply cut slab and tilted. Lya lost her balance, catching herself on one knee, but another stone slab was already forming directly beneath Soren's feet."Move!"She yanked him toward her a mere fraction of a second before the stone block snapped closed over the exact spot where he had been standing.They're not targeting our bodies directly, Lya realized with a jolt of panic. They're targeting the terrain itself. They're forcing us to move.She realized a moment too late that the triplets were methodically driving them toward the very middle of the clearing, where there was absolutely nothing to hide behind."Soren. Stay right behind me. Do not get more than two steps away from my back.""Lya—""Two steps, Soren!"She straightened herself in the center of the clearing, Soren pressed tightly against her spine. And she opened her aura wide.Water rose violently around them in a two-meter-high ring, instantly closing into a thick, protective dome above their heads. Absolute silence fell over them all at once. Through the moving water of the dome, the three enemy silhouettes appeared heavily distorted."How long will it hold?" Soren asked, his voice skin-tight."A long time.""And after that?"Lya didn't answer him immediately.After that, I'll get exhausted long before they do. There are three of them sharing the same physical effort. I am completely alone.No. No, that's wrong. I'm a Star. My raw output is much greater than theirs, even with three of them combined. That is not the real problem.She glanced over her shoulder at her little brother, who was pressing his back against hers.The problem is that everything I do also has to protect him. I can't move forward to attack. I can't get around them. I can't even hit them hard, because if I break this dome for even a second to launch an offensive, he'll be left completely exposed for three seconds.Three seconds.That is all they are waiting for.Outside the dome, one of the triplets shouted a command. The other two moved in perfect synchronization.The liquid dome took three heavy impacts in the exact same place, at the exact same split second. The water caved inward violently, rose, and managed to close again.Then, three more impacts. Same place. Same second.Then, three more again.The triplets didn't vary their strategy. They weren't looking for a structural opening somewhere else. They kept striking the exact same point over and over, and each time, the watery depression took a fraction of a second longer to close itself back up."They're looking for the weak point," Soren whispered."There isn't one.""Then they'll make one."Lya clenched her teeth until they ached. He's right.Making a split-second decision, she dropped the dome entirely.She dropped it at the exact moment the three of them struck forward. Instead of dispersing harmlessly, the massive volume of water collapsed forward in a solid, heavy wave that caught the triplet on the right, carrying his body six meters away into the dirt."ONE!"She had already pivoted on her heel. The second triplet took a high-pressure jet of water straight to his chest, throwing his body backward violently into the thick bushes."TWO!"She spun around frantically, searching for the last brother. But on her left, something was already moving in the bushes.No.The second boy she had hit was already getting back up. Slowly, one hand clutching his bruised ribs, but he was undeniably standing up. Six meters away, the first one she had swept away with the wave was rolling onto his stomach, pushing himself back up onto his knees.They're tough. They're already recovering? Well, obviously. I don't hit them to kill. I've never hit to kill anyone in my entire life.Suddenly, a cold, terrifying sensation ran straight through her stomach.But they do.The third triplet had completely vanished from her field of vision. Where—She turned her head sharply. He was standing fifteen meters away on top of a dirt mound, both of his hands raised high into the air. And he wasn't looking at her at all.He was aiming past her."SOREN!"Lya threw her entire body in front of her little brother, taking a sudden, massive wall of roaring flames head-on. She answered the fire with her water. A lot of water.The volatile elements of fire and water collided violently two meters in front of her face. And the entire clearing vanished.Thick, burning mist erupted all at once, filling the area with suspended, boiling droplets. Lya took the blast of hot steam full in the face, and her breath caught painfully."Cough— cough, cough—!"She stepped backward blindly, one hand covering her stinging eyes. The white fog was absolute; she couldn't even see her own fingers in front of her face.I can't see anything. Soren, where are you?!"Soren! Answer me!""I'm here!"He's right behind me.She desperately reached her arm out in that direction to grab him.Suddenly, three sharp beams of compressed water cut cleanly through the thick fog. They were thin, precise, and perfectly parallel. They passed a mere thirty centimeters from her hip.She heard the horrifying, wet sound they made when they arrived at their destination. They punched three distinct holes straight through the dense fog.Somewhere in front of her, hidden by the white mist, the triplets erupted in joyous cheers."We got her!""Finally!""I told you we had to wait for the fog! I told you!"Lya turned her head around. Very, very slowly.Soren was lying on the ground.He was collapsed on his side, one arm folded awkwardly beneath his torso, the other stretched forward toward her. His small fingers were still half-extended toward his sister—toward the hand she had reached out to him just one second too late.The white sand beneath his chest was rapidly soaking up a dark pool of his blood, and the crimson circle was spreading wider by the second.He wasn't moving at all.Lya's star-marked eyes widened in absolute, paralyzing horror. Then, the light in her gaze went completely empty."Huh?"