If she could get a message off to someone, maybe. She should have kept a hold of Juliana’s cellphone.
Eva jumped back from the shackles as something fell from the sky. It landed with a clatter in a heap just on the other side.
“You didn’t have to drop me,” Juliana shouted as she picked herself up.
Blinking twice, Eva let out a small sigh of relief. It wasn’t an enemy. At the moment, Juliana was even better than someone like Arachne or Ylva showing up.
Juliana was a human. She could waltz in and out of the shackles as if they weren’t there.
Again, Eva sighed. The relief brought with it exhaustion. A sudden lack of adrenaline through her system had the barrier’s draining effect feeling ten times as strong.
“Juliana. I need you to destroy this circle as soon as possible.”
Juliana’s eyes went wide as her head whipped over to face Eva. It wasn’t hard to imagine why. Eva was covered in blood and, currently, sitting in an ankle-deep pool of the stuff.
Normally, such a thing wouldn’t be that big a deal for Eva. Good, in fact. Unfortunately, none of it was controllable. It was all magically created blood. She wasn’t sure what was up with the bleeding walls. That blood seemed usable, or at least, Eva couldn’t remember even running low on blood during the previous fight with the hunter. She hadn’t been thinking perfectly straight, but the blood had just been flowing. She couldn’t even remember cutting herself after the walls had started bleeding.
The only real downside was that Eva couldn’t trigger it. It was obvious to see that the walls started bleeding during emotional distress. Obviously, being trapped in a set of shackles and nearly dying was not quite as distressing as Eva thought it should be. Or the shackles were preventing the effect from manifesting.
Either way, she would soon be out of her predicament.
While her hazy mind was going over useless thoughts, Juliana actually got to work.
She recovered from her brief shock at seeing Eva’s state and got to work. With the rooftop covered in a layer of gravel and the shackles drawn out on top in a layer of paint, an earth mage was its greatest enemy. Stretching out her hand, Juliana churned the gravel.
Eva felt herself drop an inch, landing atop the gravel as the blood escaped its confinement and spread over the roof.
Along with the barrier, the draining exhaustion immediately receded. She didn’t feel reinvigorated, but it was like shrugging off a weight from her shoulders. Breathing was easier and, after standing up, Eva didn’t feel a need to go take a nap.
An improvement no matter how one figured it.
“Thanks,” Eva said just as Saija landed on the roof.
Unlike Juliana, Saija landed on her feet. She touched down on the tips of her toes and stepped forward twice, almost like a dancer just landing out of a particularly tricky jump. The smile on her face wasn’t one of pride or joy. It was the nasty grin of someone who realized their rival just stumbled down the stairwell.
“Big bad Eva getting stuck in such an obvious trap? Here I was thinking you were something special. And after that big speech about fighting too.”
Eva didn’t bother responding. She twisted to one side, feeling the cold of an icicle brush past her skin. It landed in the rooftop with a thunk. Had she not moved, she would have an arm-sized hole in her chest.
The thunk was quickly followed by a metallic clang and a wet squelch.
Both Juliana and Saija fell to the ground. The former had torn clothes and a slight dent in her armor with an icicle lying at her side. Juliana quickly got back on her feet, molding over the dent with fresh metal as she moved.
Saija didn’t get up.
“Ahhaha, what?” Saija said as she lay face down in the gravel. An icicle stuck out of her back. Black blood dripped around her side to join with the blood from Eva’s claws. “It hurts.”
“Watch out for flying icicles,” Eva said, ignoring Saija as she glared at the red-haired hunter. “Traps too. And keep an eye on the sky.”
There were only three buildings between Eva and the hunter. Three trap filled buildings. She could try blinking across. Even blinking out to points in the air to avoid the three buildings. However, she didn’t have a lot of time to think while in mid-air. She could just wind up in another trap.
With Saija down and now shouting about a pain in her back and how much the hunter would pay, Juliana would have limited mobility. Assuming Saija had been the one carrying Juliana in the first place.
“What about Saija?”
“Can’t help her while being bombarded. Since no portal opened, she’ll survive.”
“We need to move,” Eva said, grabbing Juliana by the arm and pulling her out of the way of another icicle. Once clear, Eva didn’t stop. She continued across the roof towards the next building.
