She didn’t answer his question, leaving the two standing in silence as she struggled to take everything in. Why was her uncle there? It had been years since she’d seen him and she’d preferred it that way, but why was he pretending to be a fairy? Why was he Insia’s father?

Insia’s father.

The thought made her blood run cold and filled her with a single desire. To kill.

She remembered one of the last times she’d seen him, far back in her childhood when he’d been discussing plans with a few of the other great spirits. Plans to specifically try and create more half spirits like her, only aiming to create hybrids that would be successful, mixes that wouldn’t spend years struggling to use their mana like she had.

Mixes that could be sent to fight and die.

Her mind flashed to the small fairy she’d grown to know, so bright and friendly and full of life while also being so isolated. Her heritage hinted that whatever set her apart from the others was likely more complicated than a difference in the colour of her flames but that didn’t matter.

Thera had just discovered that that sweet girl, her cousin, had been created to act as a weapon. The emotions that knowledge provoked in her caused her mana to move, making the volcano under her feet crack and shake.

“Ah, I didn’t realize it, but you’ve learned to talk, that’s interesting,” Her uncle said. “But maybe if you could stop screaming for just a minute-”

He didn’t get to say another word before Thera moved, not caring to try and understand whatever he was going on about and instead focusing on one singular thing. He was going to die. She refused to share the world with anyone who would do such a thing and the question of if she could manage to kill a being that was practically a god in its power didn’t matter. It wasn’t even worth considering. The mana at her fingertips was already tearing out chunks of rock from the ground below, revealing molten magma beneath that was all tossed at the great spirit, only to harmlessly pass through his form, leaving him to look like he hadn’t even been attacked at all.

Of course that wasn’t going to work. A physical attack never would have.

The great spirits really did have too many advantages. Without physical bodies they were hard to damage, and not only did they each have almost double Thera’s insane mana pool, their regeneration rates were shockingly fast as well. It was obviously a fight she was at a disadvantage for even before she took into account the skill they had for their natural affinities.

But compared to the great spirits, she did actually have some advantages to make up for the fact that she couldn’t match them in skill or mana, namely variety. Each spirit was tightly bound to a single option, while she had four magics at her disposal.

If she had to ask herself how to really kill a great spirit, only two options came to mind. There was soul magic, the variety that came so naturally to demons that had likely caused the spirits' downfall in the first place, along with a second she couldn’t help but think had potential. Non-affinitied magic, specifically used in the form of magic nullification. Spirits were akin to living spells, that particular application should have been perfect, with the only drawback being her lack of experience with its application.

But now’s the perfect time to get some practice.

She saw her uncle attempt to say something but moved to act before he could, using her newest awakened skill to make a barrier around him and trapped him within, with that application of magic being leagues stronger now that it had grown so much before she attempted something she’d at that point only read about.

The principles of magic nullification were simple enough, even if putting them to practice was a whole other issue. It was a matter of using the mana within her to directly counteract an opposing mana, with the spell having a greater effect when one knew what they were going to be hit with.

That last part was usually the catch. Predicting what a different mage might do typically wasn’t so easy. If a person had even two magics then they could use them both or combine them into different configurations to try and overpower the effect, but against someone she knew could only use fire, predicting the sort of mana she’d be up against became significantly easier.

“I can see you’re mad but rather than pointlessly throwing away your mana, why don’t you try to calm down a bit?”

She didn’t bother answering, instead flooding the barrier that encased him with the spell, and for the first time, getting a reaction.A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

It looked like the fire spirit didn’t even understand what was happening at first, experiencing something almost foreign to it. Pain. But when he understood that Thera was actually injuring him he made his first move, attempting to smash through the barrier she’d created to free himself, only to fail. As his fist flew forward, Thera concentrated her spell there, destroying his arm in the process for just a second before reforming a new one, and was forced to face just how powerful Thera had become since he’d last seen her.

“Thera, I understand you’re a little unhappy right now but why don't we all just relax a little bit here?”

“I’ll be calm when you're dead.”

Even if this isn’t going to do the job.

She had him trapped, every blow he tried to strike to free himself ending with the attack being destroyed as she poured out an untold volume of mana to repel it, but keeping things up like that was destined to be a losing fight for her. As things stood, she was putting up her mana against Insedis’s and the math wasn’t going to fall in her favour, not that her uncle knew that.

Worse, the fact that her regeneration rate couldn’t keep up meant that the gap was only becoming worse with each attack. For the first time in her life, she was succeeding in scaring a great spirit at least, but she didn’t have the power to finish the job.

So what can I… Maybe that?

If she had more time she felt like she could have thought of more options to do what she needed to, but in the split second the first idea that came to mind was an application she’d seen once before from a demon during the first wave. Embude the earth itself with magic nullification and use that to attack.

She wasted no time attempting that either, and as her uncle’s attempts to escape grew more and more desperate as a sense of fear set it, she forced herself to juggle canceling each of his attacks before filling the ground beneath his feet with her power, forcing spikes of earth upwards into his body, each spear eating away at his mana more and more, giving her just a bit of an edge she could use to think of what to do next. It still wasn’t enough but that didn’t matter. It had bought her more time she could use to figure out how she would finish the job, or at least it should have.

In her rage, she’d grown blind to one important detail. Insia was coming back.

In an instant, the mountain around her looked like it was erupting as giant pillars of fire rose up and surrounded them, with the girl causing it flying to her imprisoned father’s side and screaming at her.

“Thera, what are you doing! Why are you hurting my dad!”

Hearing that only complicated her rage. She knew Insia loved her family from the way she spoke about them, there was no way she knew that she’d been created to serve as a weapon, but she couldn’t just say that and assume the small fairy would let her keep trying to finish the job, nor would she be willing to fight her friend as well, just to make sure Insedis died, leaving her with only a single option. Lying.

“Oh, you don’t need to worry, Insedis just wanted to test my skills a bit,” She told her, giving the girl a smile as she lowered the barrier she’d created before focusing on her uncle. “Isn’t that right?”

“Ah, ahem, yes of course,” The spirit said, feeling the bloodlust in the question, even if his daughter didn’t believe it.

“Then why are you still screaming about killing him!”

“Screaming? I’m not…”

Oh no.

Something finally clicked with the question. From the way it seemed Insia and Rocky sometimes seemed to read her mind to the way Insedis had answered her thoughts and commented on the fact that she’d learned to speak, it not being some sarcastic comment but instead a statement that pointed in a single direction. Her spirit comprehension, not a skill to let her get better at understanding spirits but instead one that made it easier for them to understand her. It was an ability that was letting her talk with her mana.

And I have no clue how to turn it off.

It was listed as an active skill so it had to have been something she could have controlled, but until that point she’d been using it subconsciously, she didn’t know how to keep herself from screaming at the world that she wanted the great spirit dead, nor could she figure out how to possibly explain that.

It was a problem she wasn’t equipped to solve, but one that managed to be bypassed though by the appearance of a different fairy, rushing to the girl’s side while giving a small laugh.

“Oh Insia, don’t worry. When you’re a little older you’ll understand that wanting to kill your father is really the most natural thing in the world.”

“Mom!”

“Ember?”

“Quiet you,” the new fairy, Insia’s mother, spoke coldly in a way Thera had never heard from any of her kind before until her eyes moved to Thera, taking on a brighter tone. “And you must be Thera! Oh, my little flame has been going on and on about how happy she was to meet you. I guess from your reaction, you really are related to this idiot, aren’t you?”

“Wait, related?” Insia asked, looking at everyone in confusion as Thera filled in the blanks for her.

“It looks like it. I’m the daughter of the great earth spirit, Abrus. That makes us cousins,” She told her, smiling brightly as she enjoyed the fact with the fairy looking just as excited, her earlier concerns reduced thanks to her mother speaking in Thera’s defense, even if the way she’d defended her acts had only created more questions.

“Ahem, so now that we’re all a little calmer, can we just talk for a bit?” Her uncle asked, being rewarded with a far colder look for the question, even if Thera gave in at the end.

“Fine, but not here. Come on.”

“Um, where?”

“We’re seeing my father. You have a lot of explaining to do.”