Andrew Rowe - Sufficiently Advanced Magic

She managed to regain her footing, but the lead barghensi was almost on top of her.

I set the child down and dug into my pack, but I was far too slow to help.

The barghensi opened its jaws as it closed in.

Vera jumped, pressing the other switch on the dueling cane and landing on the creature’s back. It was pretty impressive, but she fell right off. Not a combat attunement indeed.

The barghensi turned as she fell, rearing up to smash down on top of her. I did the only thing I could think of to help: I threw the candle from my bag at the tile closest to them. It wasn’t very heavy, but I hoped…

The trap triggered.

Vera, still on the floor, was still too low for the arrows to hit her. The barghensi, standing tall, was not so lucky.

In seconds, the first barghensi was riddled with arrows. It fell backward rather than forward and stilled as it struck the ground.

The second barghensi, however, was unharmed.

Vera rolled as it approached, avoiding its charge, and jammed the blade of the dueling cane into its side. The creature roared, turning toward her… and she fired a blast of mana into its open mouth.

The creature shuddered and collapsed, lifeless.

Vera pushed herself to her feet. “Thanks for the assist there. That’d have been a lot messier otherwise.”

My eyes were fixed on the second barghensi’s corpse, and my hand drifted up toward my throat. I wondered what it felt like to swallow a blast like that.

I shook it off. “Glad to help. Can you get back down now that those things are dead?”

She tested it. She could. “Guess we can probably move freely in and out of any section we’ve cleared.”

I pointed at the kid. “Should I put him back at the entrance and help you with that guy, then?” I indicated the bronze statue. “He looks pretty mean.”

It might have been my imagination, but I was pretty sure it turned its head toward us when I said that.

That was disconcerting.

“Not sure if that’s a good idea… you still don’t have an attunement. But I’m not going to refuse help if you insist.”

After seeing her almost get mauled back there? “I insist.”

She helped me move the kid back to the entrance, and then we stepped back to where the barghensi had fallen.

I turned my head to her. “You fought anything like that before?”

She shook her head. “No, but it’ll probably be tough to crack with physical attacks. Doubt the arrows will do much. Maybe the sword in there is special?”

I’d considered the same. Maybe the book knew more, but I was worried about taking the time to send a message and await a response. “Probably worth trying to get it out, at least. And if we can’t, I can just try to distract it while you hit it with the dueling cane?”

Vera nodded. “Sounds good. Lemme see…” She put her hand up against the pillar. “Not glass. It’s just thick ice. I think I can break it.”

I nodded, stepping out of the likely path of any water that the pillar might release. “Go right ahead, then.”

She stepped back, too, then fired a shot from the dueling cane into the center of a pillar. A crack spread across the surface where the mana had connected.

The statue moved. An echoing voice emerged from its mouth. “Defilers!”

That didn’t sound good.

There was grinding sound, then a crack as the statue’s foot shattered the stone where it stepped.

Vera shot the pillar again, broadening the crack.

The statue bent its knees and leapt, right at Vera.

“Resh!” Vera dodged out of the way as it descended, already beginning to swing its swords at her.

She ducked a swing aimed at her head, blasting the statue in the chest in response, but it barely budged from the shot.

The pillar was cracked, but the crystal still hadn’t broken.

I didn’t have anything heavy to hit it with.

“Can you hit it again?” I shouted to Vera.

The statue turned toward me and hurled a sword in my direction.

I just barely stepped out of the way in time.

Realizing that might be a viable weapon, I rushed for the thrown sword — only for it to vanish as soon as it hit the opposite wall.

“I’m a little busy!” Vera replied to my request, deflecting a sword with the dueling cane’s blade. She was better with the weapon than I’d expected, swiftly deflecting two cuts from the statue with perfect precision, but it was overwhelming her with the sheer number of angles it could attack from.

She stepped back, giving more ground, and barely avoided triggering another trap.

I rushed back toward them, but I still didn’t have a weapon.

I’m going to regret this.

I rammed myself shoulder-first into the crack in the pillar.

The ice caved on impact. I was bathed in freezing water and tiny fragments of frost.

My dueling tunic protected me from the worst of it. None of the icy shards were pushed free with sufficient force to pierce through it.

But the water was cold , and it hit me with sufficient force to push me to the ground.

The statue turned toward me again, raising a hand, but Vera stepped in and slashed the arm with the dueling cane’s blade. The sword arm went limp, a visible gash where the mana-charged blade had cut deep into it.

That bought me a moment before it threw another sword at me with a different arm.

I didn’t have time to dodge.

Instead, I raised the still-sheathed sword, which had flowed out of the water right next to me, and deflected the thrown blade out of the way.

“Nice!” Vera shouted.

I grinned, standing and drawing the weapon.

It looked like a rusted piece of junk.

That , I considered, is just what happens when I rely on hoping for the best.

But, rusted junk or not, it was a weapon. I ran the statue anyway.

The statue didn’t deign to give me its attention this time. Vera had been forced all the way to the back wall and she blasted it with mana in between parries.

I hit the statue in the back. There was a loud clang and my arm rattled from the impact, but it didn’t do any visible damage.

I did succeed in making it angry.

The statue turned to face me, lashing out at me with three different swords.

Fortunately, this was a game I knew how to play.

I stepped left, deflecting one of the blades into the other two, then kicked the statue in the knee.

As I expected, it wasn’t very well balanced.

The statue stumbled backward, and I lashed out, landing a glancing blow across its face.

Still no damage.

It responded with a slash across my abdomen. I stepped back, failing to avoid it entirely, but my dueling tunic repelled the glancing blow.

Then the blade of Vera’s dueling cane burst through the back of its head, and the statue collapsed to the floor.

I took a step back, breathing a sigh of relief. “Whew.”

Vera leaned back against the wall, breathing heavily. “You can say that again, kid. I haven’t had a fight like that in ages, and I don’t care to have one again.”

I nodded, sheathing the sword and lifting it to show it to her. “You mind if I hold onto this thing?”

“Nah,” she dragged the word out into an exhale, still trying to get her breath back. “Think you earned it. Think you can carry the kid over here, though?”

I set the sword down. “Yeah, you handled a lot more of the fighting. Only fair.”

“Thanks.” She grinned at me. “You did pretty well yourself, though.”

I returned the grin, heading back to the other side of the room. I picked up the child gingerly — his condition seemed unchanged — and then carried him over to Vera, next to the door.

As I returned, the monsters shimmered and vanished as one, leaving tiny colorful crystals behind in their wake.