The speed with which I adapted to being both Lili and Lores had to be magical. It just had to be, because I felt comfortable with it almost instantly. I was Lili as much as I was Lores.

  There were differences between the two, and it wasn’t just about body size. Something deeper had shifted too and the results was a subtle split in their personality. Or maybe it was more like each part had a different focal point: priorities, preferences or even instincts.

  Whatever it was, it came with an unexpected bonus: I could now argue with myself out loud without immediately sounding crazy.

  Of course, when it came to it, Lili didn’t want to integrate. As a dragon, I had no hair where she could perch, and she’d likely fall off mid-flight. That argument finally convinced her. She agreed to merge, and to my relief, that part of the transformation spell held up beautifully.

  Still, I kept talking to myself during the flight. Apparently, this was my new normal. And oddly enough, it brought a flicker of nostalgia - reminding me of the old times with Flo.

  Since we couldn’t agree on the best approach, I went with a dual strategy. I landed in full dragon form on one of the castle’s larger terraces, shattering whatever magical shield had been placed there. The outer barrier covering the entire structure had been the first obstacle and it had taken real effort to punch through.

  Then, just as I transformed back into my human form, Lili zipped off to scout.

  She didn’t even wait for my go-ahead. That was slightly annoying as she just separated on her own. I didn't even thought it was possible, but here we were and I let it slide. She couldn’t go far anyway. So while she darted off to investigate, Lores stayed behind and began spreading death and destruction.

  Once Lili found Ju, I’d stop the carnage, head over, free my favorite elf, and leave.

  Until then, I would advance slowly and methodically - cleaning house. It was meant as a message: a clear warning to anyone who might think of recapturing her in the future.

  *

  A thunderous boom shook the room, and Gidyon snapped his head up, eyes scanning for danger. For a moment, everything was still. Then a soft, ominous chime echoed and he knew what that meant: the main ward had been breached. Whatever monster had been unleashed was now inside the compound.

  They needed a secure room. But what could be more secure than the main library, protected by an independent layer of wards and enchantments?

  He glanced at the lady of the house. She merely shrugged, and that settled it, they were staying put.

  A bit farther away, Grom, captain of the guard, exhaled heavily as the boom rattled the walls. Just weeks ago, he’d once again tried to persuade the old chieftain, K’hordock, to reinforce the shields. But the stubborn orc had refused.

  “They’ve held for a century now,” K’hordock had said. “There is no need to waste effort on upgrades.”

  Instead of strengthening the defenses, the old fool had funneled resources into his pet obsession - researching immortality.

  Well, old man, Grom thought grimly, now we’ll see how useful that research really was.

  *

  A wave of undead warriors and mages surged toward me from every direction. I blasted them back, but they had a frustrating resistance to black magic, and soon, too many hits were landing too fast for me to block or dodge. Their relentless assault made it nearly impossible to focus, let alone cast with precision.

  I shifted into shadow form to reposition, hoping to regain control, but even that didn’t save me. Something was tracking me, hitting me with spells even in this form.

  When I briefly materialized to get a better look, my mind froze.

  There, weaving between the skeletal warriors and spell-flinging corpses, was a creature with black wings and long, skeletal claws, gliding like smoke and dread incarnate: a black angel, level one hundred and two.

  How the hell was that even possible?

  In the game they were known as the ultimate evil, and they deserved the name.

  The vision triggered a memory. One of Flo's memories - scraps of a memory she hadn’t shared with me. These black angels were the failed fruits of her father’s pursuit to create perfect warriors. The experiment had backfired so catastrophically it had destroyed his entire nation and left it a cursed wasteland, now called the Black Angel’s Desert. Were they golems, then? Of a sort?

  I shook the thought away. It didn’t matter now.

  But somehow, K’hordock had found a way to control one.

  I didn’t have time to dwell on it. Every time the black angel fired, the undead mages followed suit, launching coordinated volleys at the same spot. They couldn’t see me, but he was guiding them, turning their chaos into lethal precision. It felt like sprinting past a firing squad with a beacon strapped to my back.

  I started to eliminate those undead mages one by one, with physical hits, but they were resilient enough to require several hits each and meanwhile even more were streaming in the room around me, while the wounded tried to run away.

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  I felt like a giant spider dropped into an ant nest. Sure, I could squash any one of them, but the whole swarm was slowly wearing me down, skimming away at my life one painful hit at a time.

  Why weren’t my fireballs, thunder blasts, or ice bolts ripping them apart? Even my black blasts, supposedly on par with a black angel’s, weren’t doing enough damage to turn the tide in my favor.

  Maybe you’re doing something wrong, a voice in my head offered helpfully.

  No shit, Sherlock. But what?

  I knew my skills and spells were under-leveled for someone of my power, but what was I supposed to do? There were no scrolls lying around with high-level spells waiting to be learned. My only hope was to keep casting and hope they slowly leveled up through use.

  If that even worked...

  Was there another way?

  I thought about how Lili had rewritten my . She’d simply shaped the idea and used magic to transform it. But was that something I could replicate? Could I keep modifying myself like this through magic? Was that even healthy, and if so, where would it end?

  Still, fighting like this wasn’t sustainable either.

  I could try transforming into a dragon again… but what would happen to Lili? I didn’t know. And besides, I was already deep inside the castle. The place was too small for my dragon form, if I transformed here, the whole damn structure would probably come crashing down on me.

  What would a giant spider do in an ant nest? Get the hell out of dodge, then deal with the few ants still clinging to it.

  Should I pull back and let Lili handle the scouting? But I couldn’t. I had to stay close. Already, I could feel the strain in our link from her drifting too far. I needed to move closer to let her continue her inspection properly.

  Luckily, the damage I was taking wasn’t escalating too quickly, which kept me from spiraling into panic and running. But I still had to find a solution, and soon.

  So what else could I try?

  The weapons and armor I had in my inventory were worse than useless, my spells and bare hands were more effective than any sword, axe, or spear. Wearing armor wouldn’t help either. It would only break faster under the pressure.

  But… I could create objects.

  I’d never been especially talented at crafting, but I used to clothe myself in illusions. What if I now willed those illusions into real objects? I had already managed some basic repairs and even conjured a few items, so I knew it was possible.

  The runes I had learned from previous spellwork danced in my head. However, those were nothing like what I needed now. I needed to create something better, not mundane objects.

  Flo once told me runes were just crutches, scaffolding for the real magic beneath. Training tools. Runes help you get there, but the goal was to move beyond them. Lili had clearly ditched them already when she had altered my . Maybe it was time I did too.

  I imagined a helmet, nothing more, and suddenly, it was there on my head. Solid, real and functional. Spells could work like this?

  Ah, those constant hits to my head were finally blunted!

  And I didn’t need to make these objects permanent. I could craft them just for this fight. Temporary objects lowered the mana cost significantly.

  Next came a shirt and a pair of trousers. Piece by piece, I conjured my armor, and to my relief, the damage I took began to drop. I could even shadowmeld, then reappear and recast the armor instantly over myself. It cost more mana, sure, but it was manageable.

  Then came a shield, and a sword crackling with added magical damage.

  From a hunted beast scrambling to survive, I suddenly became a force holding her ground.

  Gradually, I began to carve out some breathing room around me.

  If I could conjure a sword, why not a spear? A spear already in motion, launched as I created it.

  But no, somehow, I couldn’t conjure it mid-flight. It only worked when I mimicked the throwing motion with my hand. So, I dismissed the sword and began conjuring spears one after another, hurling them at my targets.

  Did I actually need to hold the spear in my hand? Not really.

  So, what if I conjured two spears at once, and throw them at two different targets?

  It worked. It even worked with three. Even when my enemies moved, I could still guide the spears to strike.

  With more than three, though, the control weakened and my accuracy dropped. So I scaled back to three. That was the best balance, clean, efficient, and deadly.

  When the black angel fired its deadly blast and I managed to block it with my shield, I felt a jolt of satisfaction.

  That damn thing was trickier than the ghoul or skeletal mages. It kept slipping into mist form the moment my spears were about to hit, dodging damage like smoke through a net.

  So I tried something new: firing a magic blast alongside the spear, or weaving extra magic damage into the weapon itself. That worked. Finally, it began to take real damage.

  But I couldn't enjoy too much. My skin was a mosaic of cuts, scrapes, and burns. Some of the wounds from my fight with the dragon had reopened, and blood was trickling down anew, leaving a trail of crimson drops in my wake.

  My life was ticking down, and so was my mana. I could feel it. I had maybe just over half my mana and that was bad enough.

  All those conjured spears were bleeding me dry. I didn’t have infinite resources, and the fight wasn’t ending fast.

  Did I really need to conjure an entire spear each time?

  Maybe not.

  A tip would fly just as fast - maybe even faster - and would cost a tenth of the mana. Why hadn’t I thought of that earlier?

  How big was this castle? I’d already blasted my way through dozens of rooms, each one different, each one a work of art in its own right. And I was still only on level three or four? Meanwhile, Lili was off exploring multiple levels of dungeons beneath the place!

  And I still hadn’t found her. Where could she be?

  I needed more time... Maybe I could try life drain?

  I tried, but there was no life to drain from the undead.

  Instead, I found I could siphon a bit of mana. Not much, just a trickle, but it was still something. Twisted, corrupted mana. I couldn’t use all of it, but some parts were viable.

  The rest, I simply had to discard. There was no elegant solution for purging the unusable, foul mana. All I could do was rely on my body to process it slowly, filtering out the twisted remnants and eliminating them naturally.

  It wasn’t ideal, but it kept me going. My mana reserves were no longer dwindling.