Could she draw out a summoning circle in the air, just around the smoking beast? They had needed this massive circle to summon whatever sliver they had managed to pull through, but the body was already there. Surely it could slip through a standard summoning circle and take over what was already here.
So long as she used her blood and kept it off the primary ritual circle, it shouldn’t interfere. So long as she had her ritual circle theory down. Zoe’s class wasn’t really supposed to go in depth into that subject for another year or two. It might have been a good thing to research up on her own prior to starting anything, but it was obviously too late now.
Eva threw out an arm. With it, a stream of blood snapped around the avatar. Inside the perfect circle, Eva drew out a star and several assorted lines and sigils. Constructing it out of blood took mere seconds thanks to her being able to build the entire thing with nothing more than a thought. She didn’t have an enticement to toss in. If the avatar’s body wasn’t enough of an enticement for Void, she didn’t know what would work.
Unable to move closer, Eva left a thin strand of blood stretched between her and the circle. She treated it like an extension of her own arm and forced her magic through it and into the summoning circle.
Another set of glowing lines started up as the floating circle started to rotate in mid-air. It was a strange sensation. Eva could sense her blood being stationary, right where she had left it. Yet she could see it ticking around the circle with her own eyes.
And she could see something stretching out from the circle. Thick tentacles, each tipped with a maw of teeth and lined with eyes.
Definitely not the flaming light that had once inhabited the avatar’s smoky body.
The real question was, did she let the enigma continue to come through in the hopes that Void might slip through sometime, or did she cut it off now.
A lightning bolt passed straight through the intangible Avatar and struck the emerging enigma.
Eva wasn’t sure what was supposed to happen, but she had not expected it to explode. Blood and puss splattered everywhere, spraying out from the summoning circle. But it was only the outer layer. Rather than the organic and bloated mess that accompanied many of Life’s minions, a smooth sphere with legs finished climbing out of the summoning circle. The white shell cracked like an egg as it rushed across the surface of the main ritual circle.
Right towards Eva.
Eva swiped out. Whatever it was, it wasn’t of Hell. It couldn’t be good for her.
But her wings never connected. The thing disappeared with a pop before Eva could even see what had been inside the egg. Off in the distance, a bright violet light washed over the treetops.
Juliana must have teleported it. That was the only explanation that Eva could think of. Unless it had been designed to teleport away. She didn’t know what the point of it charging at her was, if that was so.
Regardless, Eva collapsed the summoning circle immediately. The avatar hadn’t stirred in the slightest and she could already see the tentacles of another enigma worming its way out of Hell. No sense giving Life another opportunity to ruin everything by letting more enigmas through.
That plan had been a failure. What else could she do?
Behind her, the light from the thin beam of violet that was running between the eye overhead and the brain slice was growing brighter. Slowly, yes, but steadily. Eva didn’t know what that meant. It probably wasn’t going to turn everything to flowers and sunshine.
Or maybe it would, but that was the problem. Eva didn’t really want to be a flower. Especially not a tumorous one. She doubted that anyone else in the immediate area felt differently.
So summoning Void was a bust. Maybe if she had more time or a Catherine who wasn’t twenty yards away, she could figure out a better summoning circle to use.
Turning back to Life, she considered Void’s original intention. Corrupting it. Somehow, she doubted that encouraging it to lie or walking up and shaking a tentacle with a few hundred dollar bills in her hand would work.
But…
But!
Probably not, but she didn’t have any better ideas at the moment.
Eva whipped out a small circle of blood in front of her and started filling it in. She stared at the circle, ignoring another bolt of lightning and trusting someone else to take care of it. She didn’t know ritual circle modification theory well enough, but this… It might work.
It would be a pretty big might. But she was out of options. The only other thing was killing the entire ritual and hoping that they could try again at another time.
Eva’s arms shot skyward, filling the air around her with blood. Because of the distance between the two avatars, she would need a lot of it. Enough to make this ritual circle large enough to encompass the two of them.
