Chapter 35: The Ghost In The Flames
Zandagar clenched his obsidian fists, the tips of his fingers creaking like old stone under pressure. The molten glow within his hand surged brighter, pulsing in rhythm with his fury.
"Still standing?" he hissed through gritted teeth, voice dripping with venom and disbelief.
He flicked his wrist again.
With a sound like splitting metal, more rings of fire spiraled into existence behind him—larger this time, nearly double in size. Their edges crackled and warped the space around them, golden glyphs rotating within the circle rims like ancient mechanical devices unlocking. Heat surged forward in waves, scorching the air.
Zandagar's mouth twisted into a vicious grin, his voice thunderous with arrogance.
"Let's see if you can dance forever, insect."
From the portals, new fireballs were born—not mere spheres, but massive orbs the size of boulders, churning with chaotic heat. The molten surface didn't just glow—it bled, dripping molten trails that hissed as they vanished mid-air. The ground below them melted into blackened glass even before they launched.
They didn't fire all at once.
First, two came—a test.
Seraphina's eyes flicked to them. Her grip shifted slightly. The blade in her right hand tilted, its tip brushing the earth like a conductor preparing the first note of a symphony. Then—
Slash!
A clean, almost delicate horizontal cut. One orb burst apart, the explosion blooming like a sunflower of flame. Before the blast fully formed—
Slash!
A vertical cut, upward. The second orb split cleanly before it could detonate, the remnants spinning away harmlessly, their heat absorbed into the air.
But Zandagar wasn't done.
His fingers twitched.
This time, they came in clusters—dozens. Firing in spirals. Spreading. Darting. Weaving like serpents through the air. Some zigzagged. Others dove low, skimming the blackened battlefield before rising again like striking cobras.
Seraphina moved. Barely. A twist of the ankle. A shift of the torso. Her blade danced—too fast for the eye to follow.
But—
One orb feinted mid-air. Then split into three.
Two curled away, while the third struck low. It clipped her left leg.
Boom!
An explosion erupted at her feet. Smoke surged like a geyser. Her body was obscured from the knees down.
Before the dust settled, another orb came from the left. Spiraling, dipping low—
Boom!
A second blast consumed her side.
Zandagar's eyes glittered. His grin widened. He leaned forward, watching.
Then, from above—
Boom! Boom!
Two came down like falling suns. One struck behind. The other landed just in front.
The blasts weren't just fire—they were force. Chunks of earth exploded upward. Waves of dust spread outward in ripples. The ground cracked, split, then sank beneath the fury of the barrage.
Smoke rose. Black. Dense. Choking.
It covered everything.
A silence followed—thick and unnatural, broken only by the whisper of burning wind.
Zandagar stood tall, shoulders squared, the firelight dancing across his obsidian form. His eyes narrowed, scanning the chaos with smug satisfaction.
"See that?" he said aloud, to no one. Or maybe to the world itself. "That's what happens when you stand before a god and pretend to be his equal."
The battlefield was unrecognizable. Blackened. Shattered. Smoke towered in columns, slow and serpentine, stretching toward the ceiling like the breath of some slumbering titan.
Zandagar tilted his head. He was still watching. Still waiting. But already… already declaring victory.
"You're nothing but soot now," he muttered, stepping forward slowly. "A smear. A memory."
He lifted one foot. Let it fall with weight.
"And now—"
He stopped.
Because something moved.
A twitch within the smoke. A shift in shadow. A disruption in the curtain of ash.
Zandagar's grin twitched. Faded. His mouth hung open slightly.
"No…"
The smoke began to part—but not quickly. Not dramatically. Slowly. Elegantly. As if some unseen hand brushed it aside like silk.
And then—
There she was.
Seraphina.
She emerged like a ghost out of legend, silent and still, her figure forming piece by piece from the haze. First the outline. Then the cloak. Then her blade.
She was standing.
Not staggered. Not bleeding. Not even breathing hard.
Her cloak fluttered softly, frayed and torn at the edges, but it carried itself with a strange elegance—as though it refused to fall with disgrace. The hem dragged against the charred ground like a flag carried through war.
She stood sideways to him—body turned, one leg forward, her right arm low and relaxed. The tip of her sword rested gently against the scorched earth, as if the battle had never happened. Her left hand, raised behind her, opened slightly—palm out, like the poised hand of a dancer frozen mid-spin. A counterbalance. A measure of grace in the storm.
Her face was unreadable. Half-lidded eyes. No fury. No fear. No pride.
Just calm.
Focused.
Perfect.
She didn't speak. Didn't move.
Because she didn't need to.
Behind her—the battlefield was gone. Flames devoured the earth. Smoke still curled skyward in slow, spiraling trails. Cracks in the ground glowed with residual heat like veins of dying lava.
And still—she remained untouched.
Unshaken.
Unbent.
Her silence, cold and complete, was louder than every explosion Zandagar had summoned.
He stared at her, for the first time unsure.
"...What are you? How did you survived that?" he whispered, the words slipping past his lips like a confession.
But Seraphina did not answer.
The battlefield had fallen silent—almost reverent. As if the world itself held its breath for her.
Seraphina still hadn't moved.
The wind pulled gently at her cloak. Her blade remained lowered, catching the light of the distant flames. Ash drifted between them like falling snow.
Zandagar's hands twitched, but he didn't attack. Not yet. He needed to understand what he had just seen.
And in that stillness, her mind wandered—
Back.
---
—Flashback—Moments Earlier—
The fireballs screamed toward her, dozens at once, their paths spiraling, unpredictable. Too many to cut. Too many to dodge.
She knew it.
Her body reacted on instinct—but her mind? It calculated. It prepared.
"If I step left, two will redirect. If I leap, the top cluster splits. The one behind…" Her gaze flicked toward the largest ring forming above.
That one is the core.
Then came the first impact—low and fast. She couldn't dodge it entirely.
Boom!
Pain blossomed in her thigh. Her body staggered. The smoke blinded her.
Another one hit. Her ribs. The force bent her sideways.
Boom!
Then another behind—too close to react.
Boom!
Fire devoured the world.
But Seraphina didn't resist it.
She let it consume her.
As the next blast erupted above, she whispered something, low and deliberate:
"First Form: Petal Drift."
And then—
She vanished.
Not entirely.
Just… shifted.
The fire passed through her—not missing, but phasing. Her form flickered, like a reflection dancing across shattered water. Her body twisted mid-air, hidden in the storm, her breathing slowed to a rhythm between heartbeats.
It wasn't teleportation.
It wasn't illusion.
It was flow.
The technique wasn't meant for escape. It was for surviving the inevitable.
She bent like a reed, let the flames wrap around her, never meeting force with force. Her blade spun—not to attack, but to manipulate the air. A spiraling slash around her legs blew the smoke down. A horizontal cut disrupted a blast's pressure wave. Her cloak caught fire, briefly—she shed it like skin, letting it billow upward as a decoy.
She landed on one foot, weight centered, and—
Another orb came.
She didn't cut this one.
Instead, she twisted her body just slightly. Let it brush past her shoulder. The explosion erupted behind her.
Boom!
The shockwave lifted her. She bent into it, used it.
Spun mid-air.
Then landed.
Still inside the fire. Still inside the smoke.
But unharmed.
She crouched there—eyes closed—breathing in the silence between detonations.
And when the final blast struck down—
She was already moving again.
A wide circular slash spun the smoke away from her. She caught her cloak before it hit the ground. Wrapped it back around her. Straightened her spine.
And stood.
—Flashback Closed—
---
Now, Seraphina blinked once, returning to the present.
The smoke had cleared.
Zandagar still stared at her.
She took one slow step forward. Just one.
Her blade scraped gently against the cracked ground.
Zandagar flinched.
Seraphina finally raised her eyes—half-lidded, glowing faintly now, like embers hiding under ash.
And finally—she spoke. Voice soft. Icy.
"You mistake destruction for power. That's your flaw. I expected more from something that calls itself a god."
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(Chapter Ended)
A/N: Is the pacing too slow, or does it feel right? Please let me know in the comments. And thank you for reading this chapter!
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To be continued...