Alchimia Rex

With venomous rage curling her lips, the Sorceress stormed through the crowd, her crooked staff held high. Her every step was punctuated by the crackling of purple elemental chains as they shot out from her weapon, seeking their target. With no time to react, the finely dressed woman on the small rickety podium was caught, sent careening into the mud, writhing as the magical bindings dug into her blue dress and flesh.

It was swift, the Sorceress snatched her coveted trophy, eyes gleaming with triumph. With a second wave of her staff, the elemental chains gagged her prisoner. Another flick and the chains thickened, tightened, drawing pained grasps from the feeble human. "Do not move!" She proclaimed to the crowd, stepping onto the victim, power crackling between her fingers.

The threat was clear, maiden and human alike knew the fate that would follow.

And just like that, the guards were rendered immobile.

Her bandits had taken this distraction to dance through the crowd with practiced ease. They ignored the maidens, seeking humans and yanking them by the head, kicking their legs out from behind, forcing them to their knees. Mousy ears and fast hands, each bandit would bring their knife to their hostage's throat.

One of the maidens reacted, lunging, claws at the ready, elemental energy coursing through her.

The bandit yanked the blade in a spray of crimson. All at once the shock turned to horror. "Pin her down or your humans die!" The Sorceress proclaimed as the first victim fell listless to the ground. The crowd surged, the weight of five holding down the one before she could take another step.

The Sorceress stood tall, her voice cutting through the chaos like a blade. "If any of you move, they all die!" The bandit leader couldn't help but laugh at the thought of how easily she had taken control of an entire village with just a couple dozen Mousegirls.

The villagers were like a boiling pot, their fear and desperation causing them to froth and writhe, yet if any of them dared to move, the others would restrain them the moment the daggers pressed just hard enough to draw blood from the hostages. They struggled, trying to escape, and even shouted commands, but they were humans, weak even when compared to the weakest maiden.

"Now step back!" the Sorceress commanded, voice cold as ice. "Move away from your humans or they will get a new breathing hole!"

The Sorceress's words were like a whip, lashing the crowd into submission. They simmered with contained fury towards the Mousegirls, reluctantly backing away from the hostages, their snarls, growls and yowls echoing through the village square. But they'd been pacified, and that was all they needed.

With a flourish, the Sorceress raised her staff to the vibrant blue summer sky, unleashing a minor explosion that sent a cloud of sparkling smoke billowing into the air. The crowd of maidens recoiled as one, the shock nearly driving them to take action. But when they realized it was not an attack but a trick, they turned their glares towards the bandit leader.

"I said to step away from the humans. That includes the ones not under our care." She lowered the staff, pointing at the crowd. "Do not tempt me."

The bandit leader charged her staff for the next shot, her raven hair whipping around her in an unseen tornado. The glares intensified, daring her to shoot. Yet it was the humans who made their move, slowly stepping away from the maidens. Reluctant, they made their way to the hostages, joining them.

Smart. A fight breaking out would've gotten quite a few of them killed in the process. The larger maiden crowd festered, all eyes on the Sorceress. Which was good, keep them focused on her and not looking for a way out. The collective hesitation drove each individual into inaction.

"Do not blame me, blame your King for leaving you to fend for yourselves." The Sorceress sneered, yanking on the chains and forcing the captive to roll to the foot of the podium. "Should've sent this little thing in exchange for some knights. Human women are so rare, after all." She made sure to raise her voice, draw attention away and keep them from noticing the other bandits joining in and surrounding the humans.

With any luck, the bandits would only need to kill a handful more humans to set an example before leaving with their bags full and some new slaves to trade away.

"Boss!" A voice called out, and the Sorceress inwardly sighed.

There were always brave souls who wanted to make a stand. She charged her reactive barriers as she mentally went through a list of names they had scouted as the most likely troublemakers. Would it be the village leader's sister, the Harpy? The High-Elf in charge of the farms? She hoped it wasn't some random child, thinking they had big boots to fill.

Killing children always left a bitter taste in her mouth.

Her thoughts were interrupted when someone became a shrieking meteor, hurtling through the village square with the force of a hurricane, and crashing through the wall of a nearby house. A plume of dust rose from the hole, leaving an abrupt silence in the Hound's wake.

"No. Touch. Rick."

It was a tall maiden who'd spoken, nearly three meters tall, predatory blue eyes, and a body built for extreme violence. Stripped white fur covered her arms, legs, and tail. The Sorceress couldn't fathom how none of them had spotted her. Where had this monster been hiding? This was no brave maiden with an overblown ego. The Sorceress knew this was nothing but trouble.

She almost missed the human that stood next to the feline.

The bandit leader focused on this "Rick" fellow, trying to gauge his character. The pale man looked like he'd forgotten what sleep meant, bags under his brown eyes and a gaze that wasn't quite focused. His dark hair and clothes were equally worn, as if he'd spent weeks being dragged through every bush, tree, and river in the kingdom. Yet it was the calmness of his posture that unnerved felt the most out of place.

Like this was nothing more than a simple stroll.

"Monica..." the man whispered, weariness weighing down every syllable. "I told you to hold back."

The feline pouted, deflating slightly and looking at him with concern. "Bad maiden not dead. Only sleeping. Held back."

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. "That's not the point. You broke the house, the locals won't-"

"You!" The Sorceress interrupted, snapping back to attention, swerving her staff in their direction. "Tell your monster to let herself be chained or I'll burn your village leader to a crisp!"

The black collar and simplified language meant the brute was a feralborn. So long as she could get the human to comply, then the situation would get back into action. If the situation couldn't be brought back under control...

The human looked at the wriggling worm of a woman and shrugged. "Well-"

"Listen to her, my love! Human blood must not spill!" A shrill and nasal voice that grated against the Sorceress's soul emerged from the gathered humans.

A woman stumbled out of the crowd of captives and into the open, ocean blue hair cascading down her figure, framing a sculpted face with sharp angles and disapproving rosy lips. The woman's cheap wool dress tore as the fell, exposing healthy pink skin and framing the deep cleavage. She was a woman who would have fit in finely dressed among nobles or entirely naked in the cheapest whorehouse, yet here she was in a muddy hamlet, wearing shabby clothes. The Sorceress idly considered tearing the clothes away, if only to relieve them of the sin of staining such perfect curves.

The bandit leader caught herself before she forgot her circumstances further. There was something about the woman that made it almost impossible to look away. "Please have mercy!" The woman pleaded, clasping her hands together and kneeling in the dirt halfway between the humans and the Sorceress. The blue-haired beauty wore no enchanted collar, and her eyes shone with none of the telltale signs of a maiden fighting against the feral curse.

She was clearly a human. One that would catch a juicy price in the right auction.

The bandit leader normally would've ignored her, but she couldn't help but notice the feralborn brute had stilled the moment this woman had stepped out. The bandit leader wondered. A quick glance confirmed the other villagers were tense but complying for the time being, most of them eyeing the unfolding situation carefully.

The bandits closest to the humans were not moving an inch away from the hostages, while the rest others were slowly circling behind the newest threat. If a fight broke out, the entire hamlet was sure to turn into a bloodbath. The bandit leader knew the odds were in her favor, but at what cost? It could very well prove to be a crippling blow.

“Better do what she says.” The bandit leader aimed the charged shot at the blue-haired woman. “Or your wife will get to be in several places at the same time.” The Sorceress kicked away the village leader for one of her others to handle.

The feline had locked her gaze with the bandit leader’s, a shiver ran down the Sorceress’ spine.

But if the maiden didn’t attack, that would be enough.

“She’s not his wife!” A voice called out from the group of gathered local maidens.

Annoyed, the Sorceress prepared to command silence. But before she could, the feline launched a sudden and powerful attack, her shields screamed, creaking and cracking, breaking through the Sorceress's shields and sending her flying. The Sorceress, acting on instinct, aimed her charged shot at the human.

It was exactly the right move to make. The feline recognized the threat and jumped to block it with the same impossible speed with which she’d reached the Sorceress. The impact may or may not have hurt the monster, but the power within it was enough to blast her off nearly all the way back to the human’s side. Now the maiden looked at the bandit leader cautiously, aware that moving away from her human would mean his demise.

The Sorceress couldn't fathom where this creature had come from, and a shiver ran down her spine as she realized that had she not fortified her magical shields, the maiden would have claimed her life in an instant. But the Sorceress was no feralborn simpleton, and she would not be caught off guard again.

With her staff firmly in her grip, she trained it on the human, knowing that no bond between a maiden and her human partner could ever be severed. She spoke through gritted teeth, "I warned you." As she kept her eyes locked on the man, she couldn't shake off the eerie feeling that he was far too calm.

She turned her attention to the man's wife, the foolish lover. With a flick of her wrist, she unleashed a scorching blast of elemental fire, enough to inflict serious harm but not to kill. She channeled the rest of her power into strengthening her shields, bracing herself for another attack that she knew was imminent.

But to her surprise, neither of them reacted. The man and the maiden stood motionless, unfazed by the sight of the human woman writhing in the flames. The Sorceress couldn't understand how they could be so detached and unfeeling, did he loathe his own wife?

Suddenly, a searing heat enveloped her shoulder and she felt a hand gripping her tightly. A chill ran down her spine as a voice whispered in her ear, "It's really rude to ignore a woman when you get her all hot and bothered."

The heat spread through the Sorceress' body like molten lava, rendering her limbs stiff and powerless. The fingers danced up her shoulder and wrapped around her throat, choking the air out of her. She looked up to see the golden gaze of the blue-haired woman, who lifted her in the air as if she weighed nothing. The bandit leader tried to summon her powers, but something failed within her, her own powers refusing to answer.

The blue-haired maiden sneered cruelly, "Can't let you try any more of your tricks," as she tightened her grip on the Sorceress' throat, cutting her air out. The Sorceress' arms flailed helplessly. Where were her maidens? Why weren't they protecting her?

As if to answer her call, a spear was thrown at the blue-haired creature. Much to everyone's horror, it bounced off of the woman's skin as if it'd hit a stone wall, barely doing more than tear at the charred dress.

"MINE!" the maiden exclaimed.

The Sorceress' lungs filled with blessed air as the heat dissipated and her body was released from the grip. She collapsed on the ground, her body weak and her mind whirling in shock. She couldn't comprehend how or why this had happened, but she knew she needed to move, to fight, to regain the upper hand.

Just as she began to stand, the white furry backhand caught her squarely in the shoulder. The world turned into a blur of whirlwind motion. She’d flown across the village square like a doll that a petulant child had tossed aside.

With ragged breaths, the Sorceress challenged the onslaught of pain. But even as she fought to get back up to her feet, she could only stare in bewilderment as the feline had immediately turned around and was clawing at the blue-haired maiden. “You stupid cat!” the other one declared, seething, blocking the claws that should’ve gouged her arms into ribbons and merely getting light scratches instead.

“Rick said my turn!” The feline replied.

“Know your damned place!” Came the response.

The bandit leader hadn’t just been thrown around and toyed with. She was being ignored. But she wasn’t about to distract the two idiots ducking their pride it out with one another. All she would need to concern herself with would be the human. Surely, he was the key to solve this nightmare. There was no way the other bandits hadn't caught him by now.

But as the world stopped spinning, she saw her maidens were scattering into the wind, shrieking in terror as if chased by the Royal Knights. Even some villagers were desperately scrambling to escape.

The source of the terror was a singular figure, one standing next to the origin of all her troubles. It was undoubtedly another maiden. She wore a very heavy hooded cape, her features hidden within the darkness of the dull brown cloth. The leader of the bandits sensed the influence of dark elemental energy spreading through the village square like an oil stain.

She flinched as the hooded figure turned its focus her way. There were glowing red eyes underneath the hood. Panic, horror, and dread washed over every part of the Sorceress’ sore body.

But she was not some bumpkin farmer raised in the ass end of the kingdom. The beings that ruled the Red Circle were far superior. None who had met with them would find this paltry trick menacing. The Sorceress shattered the gaze's effects with but a smidgen of effort. The recoil alone made the hooded figure stumble back several steps and nearly fall.

The hooded maiden was nothing but a weakling.

“Enough of this!” the Sorceress proclaimed, raising her staff. The elemental energy coalesced into a sphere of violent crimson, purple flames licking at the edges as the air simmered with impossible heat.

With a flick, the power shot at the human.

“Rick!”

“No!”

Four voices screamed out in unison.

With no moment to spare, the spellcaster turned to her two opponents, charging her next attack as heavily as she could push it. With the human dead, their bonds must have snapped. That alone should give her room to breathe while the maidens handled the backlash.

She took aim at the blue-haired one. The brute she could handle easily, but the other one had hampered her powers she could not afford to ignore. But the maiden was durable, so that left her with only one option.

The binding spell shot out, dozens of ethereal chains wrapping the curvaceous maiden in a shower of sparks. Her target rolled across the ground in sudden panic, trying to fight off the spell as it quickly wrapped more and more around her body.

Something caught the Sorceress’ attention. Two shrunken bat-like wings that innocuously lay upon the maiden’s back, now revealed thanks to the torn clothes. “A Succubus!?” What was one doing here!? The kingdom had a kill-on-sight bounty on them! “Sister, I am fighting against the kingdom! Help us!”

The Red Circle would undoubtedly grant her a favor if she could bring back the maiden blessed with agelessness!

“I’m not helping anyone but myself!” With a snarl, the Succubus’ body glowed crimson, the chains began sizzling as the spell started crumbling far faster than it should have.

Faster than any of her teachers had shown. It would have been awe-inspiring under a less dire situation. The Sorceress panicked, now certain they’d inadvertently stepped into a Dragoness’ lair. Fighting the brute might have been possible, but against a maiden clearly skilled in undoing spells? A charmer at that? Her own gang, filled with weak-willed rabble as it was, could become a potential tool in the hands of the Succubus as well!

At least the monster had ignored them, preoccupied with fighting off the rest of the gang. Each swipe would down whoever had dared to get close.

The only solution was to retreat, now before the villagers figured out they had the advantage and took it. To warn the Red Circle and pray for mercy. Now while she-.

“Die, you traitorous whore.”

Pain exploded from the Sorceress’ side. A knife had sprouted from her ribs like an arrow. She stumbled, turning to face the attacker, breath escaping her in gasps. A maiden with violently pink-haired and wild purple eyes. The gaze of a woman that held the screams inside rather than letting them out. Untold fury burned within the eyes of the maiden that by any other measure would’ve been forgettable and just one more face in the crowd.

The attacker pulled the knife out, the Sorceress stumbled a step, reeling.

The pink-haired one lurched at her.

The knife slid straight back into her chest. A thread of blood followed it as it pulled out and then struck back into her gut, pulling out and threading right back into her soft body. Everything moved so slowly, again and again, each strike like the blow of a Giantess, sewing her chest with holes. Green light coated the… scalpel?

Was she being attacked by a Rapha? A healer!?

Panic pushed through the confusion and numbing shock.

With not enough focus to prepare a spell, the Sorceress' staff unleashed a burst of raw, uncontrolled elemental power. The explosion tore the pink-haired psycho away from her, and experience immediately superseded the Sorceress’ instinct to mend the wounds. To heal would be to expose herself to further attacks. She needed to reposition.

With trembling, bloodied fingers, she reached into her belt.

She unleashed the contained teleport spell. The world blurred, and she collapsed onto the roof of one of the nearby houses.

Away from any immediate danger.

“Not today.” She wheezed out the words, lungs screaming in agony. The Sorceress struggled to cast the healing spell, her powers slipped through her control like water between her fingers. It was a struggle to give it the proper shape, to fuel it, to have the spell self-realize rather than crumble or lash out.

But even if her teachers had deemed her a failure, they'd been nothing but thorough. A little pain would not stop her, merely slow her down. Soon, the flickering light and relief that washed over her told her of her success. The maiden focused on the wounds on her chest before she drowned in her own blood.

Flesh knitting itself back together screamed with pain, and she could do nothing but clench her teeth to suppress the screams. She was no healer. This was not her specialty. But what was the alternative? To be captured and become a slave again? To be killed?

Every moment was a fight that she was so very close to losing. The roof tiles around her were becoming blurred, the blue sky above spinning in a twister of white and blue, lifeblood pooling and dripping down against the mud-made masonry.

A shadow covered half the sky, obscuring the sun.

The red-eyed hooded figure, shaking like a leaf. The pale maiden’s body was half-burnt, the tattered cape billowing in the wind, revealing the deep burns covering nearly every inch of exposed skin. She had the eyes of a starved creature, inhaling the Sorceress' bloody scent with barely suppressed delight, pupils fully dilated.

The maiden licked her lips and opened her mouth, fangs gleamed with thirst.

A Fledgling? Here? Shouldn't they be on the same side?

No time for questions. She was going to die to a pathetic weakling if she did nothing.

With a wheeze, the Sorceress pooled her energy; the blood proving a better conduit than her bare palm. She unleashed every bit she had left within her in another desperate blast. Even half-dead and nearly empty, it proved an effective tactic against the Fledgling, and she got to watch the maiden shriek as she fell from the slanted tile roof, screaming, barely able to slow the crash down below.

The Sorceress coughed and laughed in triumph, though it was not lost to her how the human had been bonded to not just a Succubus and that monstrous feline, but a Fledgling as well.

No matter, he was surely dead. The monsters bonded to him would doubt start feeling the weight of the feral curse.

Even if she lost everyone from her gang today, she would rebuild. She would not let herself die in some tiny forgettable village.

With no elemental energy left to her name, the Sorceress tried to draw what she could from the environment. Normally it would've been futile, but there had been too much fighting and death. There was enough for her to scrape out for herself. She fueled the healing spell with those bare threads.

With a gasp, she felt her lungs finally close. She coughed, spitting blood. Still heavily wounded, but at least not drowning.

She turned to look down at the village square, at the chaos, and immediately spotting something that made disbelief wash over her.

The male was alive.

He looked as nearly dead as she was, but there was the pink-haired bitch right next to him tending to his wounds.

Anger boiled inside the Sorceress.

She weakly clenched her fists. But she could do nothing, not like this. She had to live, survive, and inform the others, call for reinforcements and finish this human off before he could disrupt their plans further.

There was a heavy growl behind her.

The familiar frigid chill of death washed over the Sorceress.

The icy glare of the feralborn feline pinned her in place. The monster loomed over her, the rumbling sound she emanated akin to a collapsing mountain.

“No…” the spellcaster wheezed. “No, please, no!”

A white claw reached down with a slow but unshakeable strength. The feline gripped the Sorceress’ neck, effortlessly raising her up into the air, so they were level with one another, so that the bandit leader could stare into a furious, snarling, murderous beast with two fangs larger than her thumbs.

“No. Hurt. Rick.”

With the maiden’s feet dangling from the air, the feline squeezed slowly. In that last moment, the Sorceress recognized the overgrown fangs, the oversized claws, the deep stripes. This was no mere Tigress but a Sabertooth.

The Sorceress did not even feel her vertebrae shatter.

Her corpse went limp.

The Sabertooth unceremoniously threw it off the roof. The feline maiden shifted her focus to the village square. She smelled the blood, fear, and anger. There were still others that were trying to resist.

Inhaling deeply, the maiden pooled her power through her belly and let out an earth-shaking roar. The fighting died on the spot. Villagers and bandits alike looked up at the maiden in horror.

The bandits were the first to react. They ran.

***

***

Eva raised her head from the still warm corpse of the Sorceress. She cleaned the blood from her lips, fighting against the smooth, bittersweet taste. The Sorceress had been strong, and now that the Fledgling drank from her, Eva felt her sanity returning.

With it came disgust, but it was more a gesture of propriety than a genuine emotion. Then came hate at herself for succumbing to the thirst again. Yet she could not deny it had been enough sustenance for her wounds to heal themselves; the burns were receding and her chalky white skin itched.

A shiver ran through her, the sensation of eyes focusing upon her. From the comforting shade the house provided, she peeked at the source: Rick.

The man sat ragged, bruised, and slightly burnt, hurt but not in immediate danger. His tired and half focused eyes were on her as if he could see exactly where she was, even while the shadows clung to her like a cloak.

The bond had saved him, pushed her to cover him from the worst of the attack faster than she would’ve otherwise been able to react.

Now free of the near-compulsion, bile climbed up her throat. Again, her instincts had gotten the better of her again.

The hand of the foulest creatures this world had ever seen had reduced her, the former scion of Bavtha, to a lowly maiden, a Fledgling, a parasite.

Trapped inside a body that wasn’t her own, pulled every which way by desires that were just as foreign.

Within her, the Eva's instincts salivated at the fear and blood that lingered in the air, a delicious meal ready to be feasted upon until she’d burst. The maiden instincts paid close attention to Rick, the one that was bonded to her, a treasure within her pocket, one under constant threat of being stolen. And in the center of it all was what little remained of her humanity, fighting against what she knew was an impossible war.

There were ways for a human to be turned into a maiden, but not the other way around. There was no future for her.

Yet, looking at Rick, she could only hesitate.

A human able to bond without the enchanted collars? An impossible thing for but a handful of people in the world.

Eva felt like the first time she’d laid eyes upon a pure elemental dragonstone.

The crafting material was infamous for its volatility. Used properly, it would create enchantments of incredible power. But that same source of wonders could bring unparalleled ruin if one made the tiniest mistake.

And here she stood, with the carving knife, hands shaking in fury.