*Princess, please, help the children.*

  The voice of Storm, her companion, reverberated in her head. She shook her head, trying to snap herself out of her own memory. The thought of injury terrified her. Ever since that attack, she refused to train without a full guard contingent. Her father tried to help, to make her stronger, but she still felt like a helpless child when faced with something terrifying and dangerous. Reminders of that experience shook her to her core.

  The women and their cart pulled up in front of her, and she saw the pained expressions on the crying faces of the children. She didn’t owe this planet and its gods anything. But she saw herself in the crying face of the Kineta girl, her leg bloodied from the claws or teeth of some monster. The hitched breath that came with sobs. The pain. She remembered it, as if no time had passed since that day she lay on the sand as a child, wracked with pain from the attack of a beast.

  She shook herself, pulling herself from the memory. Feeling a tear fall across her cheek, she leaned over the cart, casting Infuse Essence and activating a zone of healing energy around her. The spell helped to reduce the pain the children felt, as their bodies used the energy she output to counter the damage, speeding up the natural clotting and knitting of wounds, and their faces relaxed as they moved from anguished cries to whimpers. Morigan held her hand over the girl, whose wound looked larger and more serious, manipulating the natural essence energies of her small body to heal while converting her own anima to additional essence energy, infusing the area with bountiful life force. The bleeding slowed, and the damaged skin and muscle began to knit together.

  Morigan broke into a sweat as she tried to keep focus on her Essence magic having not ever had much need to practice her healing abilities. Her father always sent far more experienced healers on her mandated training runs. Why did she need to learn how to heal? She was a princess. No one came running to her for healing.

  Now, however, she wished she had learned how to heal more efficiently. While the girl’s wound looked more serious, she could tell that the boy continued to suffer more blood loss, his black face turning grey and ashy. She didn’t think she could maintain healing on both and her Infuse Essence couldn’t quite keep up with the seriousness of the wound. She shifted her energy from the girl, whose bleeding had slowed to a trickle, and began channeling her magic into the boy.

  The two women watched as Morigan worked, staying silent as they saw the concentration on her face. Now that Morigan had her attention on the boy, she could see the wound penetrated deeper than she initially thought, the worse of it on the back of his torso where she hadn’t seen the damage. She rushed to push the healing into the wounds, willing them to close and stave off the blood loss pushing him dangerously close to death.

  Morigan had no idea how long she worked, but the effort exhausted her by the time she succeeded in closing both children’s wounds. The girl looked fine, a healthy color returning to her pale face, eyes heavy with the exhaustion of having serious wounds healed. The boy, on the other hand, lay unconscious. His face maintained a sickly pallor, his pulse weak in his chest. She looked up at the worried mothers, unsure what to say.

  “Thank you!” The Kineta woman surprised Morigan by leaning down to give her a hug. Morigan tensed, not sure how to respond, her mind racing and insides warring against herself as she took in the situation.

  The Pireta woman leaned down, feeling the faint beating of her son’s heart as he lay motionless, “Will he be okay?” She asked Morigan.

  Morigan tried to speak, her throat dry with her own anxiety, “I… I’m not sure. I think? I think if he stays in my aura the Infuse Essence will help.” She didn’t know how to manipulate her magic to encourage the body to produce more blood, she only knew the basics of wound healing. She hoped the spell did what she didn’t know how to do.

  “Please,” the Kineta woman began, “can you come to the village? Monsters are appearing out of nowhere! Even in our houses! And most of us don’t have enough magic to fight them off in such numbers. We need help. We can’t protect everyone! We came to the temple for healing and to get help!”

  Morigan slumped next to the cart, her mind a jumble of emotions. She hadn’t found any warriors at the temple. She didn’t want to help this world and their horrible gods. But these people can’t control their gods’ actions… did they deserve to suffer and die? Her father said leaders existed to protect those who didn’t have the power to protect themselves. She had never listened before, caught up as she was in her own anxiety and fear. Now, her emotions warred within her. Rage, uncertainty, dread… and empathy. Would her father ever forgive her if she refused to help?

  —-----

  Anika cast a healing spring at Hawthorn’s feet, the water bubbling up and creeping over his body, healing the long gash in his side, the result of an enemy sun bear attack. At some point during the battle so far, Anika, Lily, and Hawthorn had all leveled. No one noticed when it happened, focused as they were on the swarming monsters. Anika hadn’t even acknowledged the prompt or put her stat point in. She didn’t have time to think about it while fighting. She would do it later.

  Their formation no longer holding as steady as it had before, Hawthorn had leaped in front of the monster’s attack as it swiped at Lily when a swarm of giant hummingbirds forced her from her mountain of dirt. She hadn’t realized the pack of bears had charged close to Anika when dodging the piercing beak of the birds. Anika, not knowing Hawthorn would make it in time, had used her Veil on Lily. At least she could heal now without having to put all her energy into Soothing Waters, as having to put her mind toward that in their current situation would lead to even greater injury.

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  The never-ending fight grew more difficult over time. The less threatening squirrels and pantopu had slowly become less prominent, and they instead encountered more of the water buffalo, sun bears, and giant hummingbirds they had fought the day Hawthorn joined them. While they hadn’t struggled against them in small numbers, the constant inundation of different monsters in far greater numbers began to take their toll. Anika found herself casting Healing Spring practically on cooldown, constantly needing to top the group up after attacks made it through their defenses. Luckily, none of the injuries had threatened the group’s life, but an injured hand or arm ruined combat effectiveness, and they needed every edge they could get.

  “Buffalo boss!” Panu shouted.

  Anika turned to see him unloading fire spells at the dangerous dungeon boss before it could cast its water shield. Anika remembered the damage they suffered from the buffalo’s strong water spell and hoped they could kill before it had a chance to cast. They had thankfully set up defensive walls before the battle, which would be helpful in preventing damage from the terrible water attacks, but the ground didn’t have as many hazards for preventing the charge attacks as they did last time.

  “Prepare to be charged! Watch out for the water that forms between its horns! Lily, put rocks in the path! Capy pack, behind us!” Anika ordered the group, hoping to prepare them for their first time facing a dungeon boss during the madness of the eruption. Philip hadn’t been with them the last time they fought the boss, and neither had Panu. She hoped they could adapt to the encounter with her instructions.

  Anika thought about casting her water spells on the beast, but it had natural water resistance even without its water shield up. She decided she should save her magic for attacking other dangerous monsters approaching at the same time as the buffalo boss. The capy pack wouldn’t be able to do much about the water buffalo, and as much as Anika didn’t like using them purely as sacrificial shields, that may be necessary during this encounter. Hawthorn could take the back line with them as well, as Philip’s armor didn’t have a weakness to the water attacks that Hawthorn’s Rock Skin had.

  “Philip, rotate to tank the boss. Hawthorn and Epona, defend our backs. Capy pack intercept anything Hawthorn can’t reach. Everyone else, focus your damage on the dungeon boss. Once its water shield goes up, focus on weapon attacks.”

  “Coming!” Philip responded, rushing over to where Panu stood in line of the charging water buffalo. He placed himself in front of the fire mage and braced himself for impact. Hawthorn bounded to their backs, raising onto his back legs to swipe at a lingering Hummingbird as he passed. Anika shuffled to the side, placing herself near one of the defensive walls and motioning Lily to join her as she readied an arrow on her bowstring. She saw Sinaya taking up a position on the other side of the water buffalo, while Panu stayed near Philip and pulled out a sword.

  The water buffalo impacted Philip’s shield with an unstoppable clang of bone on metal, pushing Philip backwards into the defensive wall behind him. He grunted as he hit the wall but maintained his posture, his shield clashing with the buffalo’s head as he thrust his trident towards the monster’s side. Sinaya unleashed a flurry of meteor hammer strikes as Panu darted forward with his sword. Anika unleashed an arrow as the water buffalo began to conjure its water shield, the water flowing from its horns and down its neck to cover its body.

  From behind her, Hawthorn growled, and Anika turned to see a pack of pantopu running towards him. A short distance away, Epona ran down a lone water buffalo, kicking its face in repeatedly with her strong hooves. As she watched, Lily’s rock whizzed past Hawthorn to impact a pantopu square in the face. For a moment, Anika felt annoyed that Lily hadn’t listened and focused on the dungeon boss. The fleeting thought gave way to a smile as she realized Lily had remembered her rock barely damaged the hard skull of the water buffalo, and thus she had turned to defend their backline. Anika decided she had probably cast her Telekinetic Squeeze on the boss before turning to assist Hawthorn. Lily’s judgment in battle had improved during their last week in the dungeon.

  Anika cast her Water Spray at the herd of pantopu, causing another to fall, and then turned back to the dungeon boss, trusting Lily to assist Hawthorn and the capy pack. She drew another arrow as she saw the orb of water forming between the buffalo’s horns.

  “Water attack incoming! Hide or dodge!”

  She prepared to duck behind the earthen wall to her right, but the water attack targeted Panu. He didn’t dodge, causing Anika’s breath to hitch as she expected to see a wound form. Instead, the attack seemed to impact his robe before immediately flowing down into the ground with no damage done. Anika assumed he had some kind of defensive ability and resolved to interrogate the fire mage about his abilities before their next encounter. A cloud of smoke began to form around the boss and Anika assumed one of the fire mages had cast their Smokescreen ability. She wondered if the decreased accuracy would impact the terrible area damage spell that had wounded Hawthorn the first time they encountered this behemoth.

  Firing another arrow, she monitored their progress with the boss. It took significantly more damage with the four of them attacking, and she expected the damaging area attack would cast soon. She glanced around, checking to see if Hawthorn had a wall he could hide behind in preparation for the attack. He fought a pair of sun bears and a trio of Hummingbirds, Lily doing her best to damage them with her rock. Epona reared to batter another bear with her front hooves as a member of the capy pack fell to a fourth sun bear. The fourth sun bear immediately turned into another capybara as Lily transformed a capy pack replacement. Anika worried that they needed more assistance on the backline, however, and thus crouched down below the wall to ensure she had protection from future water attacks from the boss while calling a warning to the others.

  “It will likely do its big water attack soon. It is difficult to dodge, you will likely need to hide! Hawthorn, put your back to a wall! Lily, come here!”

  Anika conjured her trusty Hydrorb to assist Hawthorn while making sure Lily had tucked in beside her away from the boss. She pounded the orb of water into one of the sun bears, which had cast their rock skin, making them less susceptible to Hawthorn’s damage but increasing their damage taken from Anika’s water magic. After a few attacks, the first of the two sun bears fell and Anika moved on to the other. Behind her, she could hear the continued clashing of the water buffalo against Philip’s shield. Lily’s rock supported the capy pack as they intercepted additional monsters.

  Out of nowhere, a pair of giant hummingbirds swooped down towards Lily’s back, approaching from Anika’s blind spot. She hadn’t even turned before the deadly, needle-like beaks encroached on Lily’s position. Lily couldn’t see them, and Anika’s fear overwhelmed her as she forgot all about her magical abilities, terrified that the hummingbirds would spear her companion. She threw out a hand towards them while shouting for Lily to move.