Andrew Rowe - Sufficiently Advanced Magic

I lashed out in alarm, slashing in the air and pushing a wave of mana toward the axe, but I wasn’t fast enough either.

The blade slammed right into Jin’s chest—

—and he vanished.

Reminding me of one of the very first things I’d made him.

Item that allows for the projection of an illusory self.

A part of me expected to see the real Jin appear a moment later, but fortunately for Jin, his invisibility was from a completely separate item. Moments passed and I still couldn’t see any sign of him.

I did hear him, though, when his guns began to fire.

The minotaur grunted as bullets slammed into its chest and neck.

I’d enchanted Jin’s revolvers, too — but even with transference enchantments to increase the velocity of the projectiles, the bullets didn’t seem to be doing the minotaur much harm.

The minotaur grunted, lowering its horns toward the sound of the noise, and charged.

The sound of gunfire stopped. Jin must have realized that it was tracking him through sound as soon as it moved.

I continued to move forward, slowly working to close the distance where I might be able to reliably hit the minotaur with one of the transference waves from my sword.

I really needed to come up with a good name for that technique at some point.

The minotaur halted its charge with no sign of impact, which was good.

Then it turned toward me, which was bad.

I raised my sword with both hands, preparing to push a transference slash at the creature as soon as it got close enough.

“Corin, move!”

I jumped back just as the creature’s axe swept through the air where I’d been moments before, close enough that it brushed the trailing fabric of my tunic.

That was when I remembered that I hadn’t properly recharged my barrier after the test.

The axe continued to fly past me, circling around until it landed in the minotaur’s upraised hand.

It threw the axe again immediately — right toward the location of the warning shout.

A flashing sphere of blue told me that the axe had struck home.

Jin appeared, falling to his knees as the axe flew back to the minotaur. He had no visible injuries — the barrier had successfully prevented the axe from cutting him — but barriers were terrible at stopping raw kinetic force.

From the way Jin was coughing and gripping his chest, one of his pistols fallen from his hand, I was pretty sure he’d just lost a couple of ribs.

The minotaur let out an echoing laugh, snorting into the air, and caught the axe as it flew back to the creature’s hand.

It advanced slowly now, hefting the axe over its shoulder, giving Jin more than enough time to flee.

The problem, of course, was that Jin wasn’t getting back up.

I was close enough that I could hear him breathing now, but it was a ragged wheeze.

I glanced back at my group. Marissa was bolting toward us.

But she was running at an ordinary mortal’s speed now. No aura of gold flickered around her, no Guardian power remained to give her strength.

I ran to stand in the minotaur’s path.

The creature tilted its head downward, eyeing me with disdain.

I ripped the ring that Professor Orden had given me off my finger, tossing it at Jin. Fortunately, we were close enough that it hit him straight in the chest. “Put that on and use it, now!”

I didn’t wait to see if he complied. I had a mere instant to step aside before the axe slammed into the space where I’d been standing.

I countered with a thrust into the minotaur’s thigh.

The creature howled, stepping back in surprise.

I gave my bloodstained blade a flourish in the air. “You just hurt my friend. That was a mistake.”

I turned my gaze up to meet the minotaur’s. “Let’s dance.”

The minotaur was a good ten feet tall. Almost twice my height, and probably at least five or six times my mass and strength.

But that wasn’t much different from a child of ten learning to fight against a champion duelist father.

As he pulled his axe out of the ground, I rolled between his legs, turning and slashing his hamstrings. The enchanted blade bit into flesh, but it didn’t cut straight through bone like it had with the barghensi. The creature’s Sunstone aura was a natural shield, dampening the force of my blows.

I cut twice more before it managed to spin, each cut leaving only a slight mark.

But it didn’t matter.

As the axe swept around, I ducked beneath it, thrusting upward to pierce straight into the minotaur’s chest. The blade only sank in a few inches — but that was enough.

I pushed on the aura in the blade, blasting mana straight into the wound.

The minotaur fell backward, dropping the axe to clutch its chest.

I smirked, moving in to strike a final blow—

— and its hand shot out, grabbing me by the neck.

I struck out in shock as it began to squeeze, but it turned its head aside, and my thrust aimed for the neck scraped harmlessly across a cheek.

My vision reddened as the minotaur began to squeeze.

And then the sound of a single shot rang out and the pressure faded to nothing.

I fell to my knees, panting as the minotaur collapsed at my side, lifeless. Smoke rose from the hole where a bullet had pierced the back of the creature’s skull.

I dropped my sword, shivering. I couldn’t quite process what had just happened. It wasn’t until I saw Marissa kneeling over Jin’s fallen form that I managed to push myself to my feet.

I staggered past the fallen minotaur toward where Marissa was shaking Jin.

“Wake up, Jin! Wake up!”

Oh, goddess.

I got closer to Jin, I saw something shining on the ground just in front of him. The ring.

He hadn’t put it on.

He’d picked up a pistol and saved me instead.

Resh. Jin…

Marissa glanced at me with a panicked expression. “Corin, we need to do something. He’s not conscious, and I don’t think he’s breathing right.”

I swept up the ring and knelt by the pair. “Give me his hand.”

Marissa looked at me in confusion, taking in the ring a second later. She gripped one of his hands and moved it to me. The ring didn’t quite fit on his pointer finger, so I slipped it on his index finger instead.

I didn’t have a good idea of how it worked. Orden had me activate it with my own mana. I didn’t know if I could make it work for someone else. But I had to try.

I closed my eyes, focused my mind, and pushed gray mana into the ring.

And I had no idea if anything happened.

Since I wasn’t the one wearing the ring, I wouldn’t be the one experiencing the regeneration. Thus, I felt no change.

I panicked for a minute like an idiot before thinking to activate my attunement.

There was a faint aura stretching from the ring across his arm, but it didn’t seem to be spreading further.

It wasn’t enough. I gripped the ring and pushed my mana harder, flooding it with gray, but the ring resisted the flow. It wasn’t meant to be used in this way, and I could only push it to a limited degree.

“Wake him up if you can. The ring isn’t working properly without his mind to regulate it.”

I stood up, and Marissa’s eyes followed me. “What are you doing?”

“Going for help.”

I turned toward the visage of the goddess, his body burning with sacred fire, and I walked with determination.

I came within about twenty feet before the visage deigned to acknowledge my presence. His head turned ever-so-slightly, his lips twisting downward.

Not an auspicious start.

“I know you, mortal.” Katashi raised a hand to his chin. “You may kneel before me.”

Normally, I’d want to say something snappy to anyone being that sanctimonious.