Keeping the ball of fire contained was a chore. Sweat dripped from her brow. One wrong move and she might be missing her entire top half.
It was the same technique she had used when her foot got caught in the enigma’s mouth, just ramped up to eleven. Flesh tended to be weaker than metal and stone, after all.
The flames bubbled on the marble. Eva almost lost it. She decided that its current compression would have to be enough. Any more would be too dangerous.
Shoving her flame-tipped finger into the gap in the door frame, Eva gave one last warning. “Stand clear of the door.”
She ran. Leaving the flame ball in the gap, Eva hopped over the enigma pits as fast as she could manage without falling in.
Eva dived around the corner just as the thin shell of stable flames gave way to the chaos underneath.
A veritable earthquake shook powdered rock from the walls of the alternate women’s ward. Eva waited for just a moment to ensure that everything was stable before peeking back around the corner.
Eva couldn’t help but to let a small whistle escape her lips.
The entire front of the common room was missing. The door was in two separate pieces out in the trap-filled courtyard, both absolutely covered in purple viscera from where they skimmed across the tops of the pits.
“Everyone alright?” Eva asked to the debris-strewn room.
A haggard-looking Sister Cross stepped out of one of the side rooms–Eva’s bedroom in the real world. She was not so roughed up as when she had attacked Eva the other week ago, but she was clearly running on less than full steam. Her eyes were aglow with white light while lightning crackled at her fingertips. Dark bags hung under her eyes, only increasing her tired look by standing out more under the harsh white light.
Eva kept herself tense, ready to react to anything the woman might try. Not that she thought that Sister Cross would attack her, but… well, she thought Sister Cross wouldn’t hesitate much to attack her.
They weren’t exactly on the best of terms.
To Eva’s surprise, Sister Cross just groaned, let the light die from her eyes, and turned back to the room and walked inside.
Frowning, Eva followed her. At no point did she let her guard down, just in case it was a trap.
Turns out, she needn’t have bothered. Sister Cross was lying face down on the bed by the time Eva made it across the short distance to the room.
Shalise sat in a chair in the corner. A school book lay open on the table to her side. Rather than looking like Eva’s fairly loud explosion had interrupted her studying, the brunette looked more like she had just collapsed into her chair.
She didn’t look quite so tired as Sister Cross, but the hints of fatigue were present in her face. Neither, Eva noted, looked like they had showered in several days.
“I’m glad you’re here, but did you have to do that? I thought I was going to have a heart attack,” she said, clutching her chest. She missed her heart, but that was a fairly common mistake. Not everyone had the ability to see blood.
“The door was stuck,” Eva said with a shrug.
“Now we lack a door,” Sister Cross said, moving her face the bare amount possible to clear her mouth of the pillow. “And a wall. If they attack again, we’re all dead. I’d kill you myself, but…” She groaned, angling her head back into the pillow.
Some muffled mumbles came out that sounded distinctly like she had said, “I’m too tired,” but Eva couldn’t tell for certain.
“I’ll fix it,” Eva said, already concentrating.
It shouldn’t be too hard to restore everything to pristine condition. Creating everything the way it was hadn’t been extremely difficult in the first place, just modifying it all from how she knew it in the real world. Repairing everything shouldn’t be too difficult. They would probably need to get rid of the enigmas though.
That was the plan, anyway. Modifying her domain was always fickle.
Turning to Shalise, Eva said, “I am glad that you’re safe. I was a bit worried when I saw the carnage outside.”
“Non-stop attacks. Never too many at once. Three to five would show up, charge the building, get killed, and then there would be an hour or two before the next one. We’ve been sleeping in shifts, but I can’t do much on my own.” She shot Sister Cross a pitiful glance.
“You could have warned me that I’d be fighting off an invasion force,” Sister Cross grumbled.
“Invasion force?” Eva cocked her head to one side, not that Sister Cross was looking at her to see. “You know something about these creatures?”
“Just what it seems like,” she said, lifting a hand in what might have been a dismissive wave, but was far too incoherent to discern for sure. “Why?”
