We’d moved up to actual dueling practice. Chem was making sure I used only a small fraction of my strength but I had enough control now to respond quickly without breaking any of the training swords. Or… fairly quickly, considering how pretty well every strike Chem put effort into got past my defenses.

It was hard to feel like I was showing any real progress, even after training from dawn until dusk every day for a couple of weeks now. 

Now, I wasn’t sure how much progress I expected to have been able to make in a couple weeks, but I had certainly hoped for more than this. That the combination of my apparent divine nature and Chem’s intensive lessons would have led to a breakthrough by now. After all, I didn’t have years to spend training. Not if I wanted to save this world in a reasonable amount of time.

And… if I wanted to go home again any time soon. 

Which, well… I wanted. At this point it wasn’t just Lena and Kris I was missing. I also missed my parents. We’d never been the closest, in part because I’d basically hidden in my room whenever possible after my voice had cracked, but that didn’t mean I didn’t love them. That I didn’t want to still see them, at least from time to time. To try to have some of the mother-daughter bonding with my mum that I’d missed out on when I was younger.

Heck, I even missed my annoying younger brother, even though he smelled of BO layered with cheap body spray and had terrible taste in movies. 

At the very least I wanted a way to tell them all I was alive. That they didn’t have to mourn me. 

Though I wanted so much more than that with my girlfriends. I wanted to show them the new body I’d been granted. To wrap them softly in the wings I’d gained. To… to have their children… I knew I could now. I felt it somehow. And… ok, I didn’t want to have kids just yet. We were still in college. But down the road…

As such, the frustration I felt with my lack of progress while training was strong enough that I decided to skip out on sleeping that night. Sleep had been more about taking a mental break than something my body had really needed, after all. Goddesses didn’t need sleep. We were above that sort of stuff.

So, once Aara was softly snoring, I got up quietly and ran through the motions I’d been taught. I made sure to stop if she seemed to stir, but I was able to be quiet enough not to wake her and managed to practice until the sun rose again.

A single night of cramming wasn’t going to change anything, as proven by what we ran through the next day, but I hoped it could shave some time off the overall training. An extra six hours a day had to add up.

Especially since Chem didn’t say anything that day about my seeming tired. So I wasn’t just running on hubris about my limits.

That was good to know.

---

The next day there was a knock on the door a short while before dawn. I did my best to seem drowsy as I answered it, certain that I’d be chastised for ‘not taking care of myself’ if anyone found out I wasn’t sleeping.

It was Sukura on the other side, wearing an apologetic smile.

“It looks like there was a bit of a dust storm last night. Father wants to eat early before you and him go over to clean the memorial markers,” she said. 

I had thought it had sounded windy out while I was training.

“Oh. Yes. Of course,” I replied while a half awake Aara tumbled out of her hammock.

“I’m awake!” she yelped as she stood up, brushing herself off.

“If you need more sleep you can get more. I’m fine cooking on my own,” Sukura said.

“Just give me a moment to get dressed,” Aara mumbled.

“I can help,” I offered.

Sure, I wasn’t as used to this pre-electric cooking as Aara was, but I was still one of the girls. I could cook.

I mean, a guy could have cooked too. I understood that there was crouching involved, that wasn’t easy on Chem’s bad knee, so it was fair he didn’t. But, in general anyone was allowed to cook. 

The fact it was the other two girls doing it while I was being ruled out alongside a guy felt a bit less gender affirming than I liked, though. Even if Sukura had no way of knowing I was trans, and so clearly wasn’t doing it on purpose…

Listen, dysphoria isn’t always rational, ok? That’s how ‘ewphoria’ exists. 

So… yeah. I was struggling with some irrational gender messiness.

“When I say I can do it alone I mean I prefer to,” Sukura said, having leaned in for a whisper. “Miss Aara merely insists on helping with any food I make for you.”

“She does?” I asked, while watching the half Gnoll girl hunt sleepily pull her shirt on.

Was she still worried about me after how rough of a place I had been when she’d found me? I had figured it was clear I’d recovered fine enough.

“Very caring girlfriend you’ve got there, even if she’s quite territorial,” Sukura said.

I blinked. “Girlfriend? Pardon?”

It was Sukura’s moment to seem confused. “Isn’t she? The way she talked about you…”

“No? No… I mean, she’s like… how old are you, Aara?” I asked in a louder voice as she plopped her nightgown onto her hammock.

“I’ve lived through twenty seven dry seasons?” Aara replied.

“You’re twenty seven?” I said, staring down at her. “B-but… I… you’re tiny?”

“I’m part Aard-Gnoll,” she said while passing by, as if that explained everything.

Well, based on how Sukura nodded, I supposed it did. To those who were from here.

I decided to assume an ‘Aard-Gnoll’ was like the Gnoll equivalent of a Halfling. Or a Homo flore—something or other. The tiny ancient humans from Indonesia.

Whatever it meant, I followed the other girls to the kitchen, where Chem was quietly whittling away at some wood. I sat down across from him while Sukura and Aara started cooking. There was only so much space around the fire, so a third person trying to crowd in there wouldn’t help. 

Instead, I was left thinking about Aara and what I’d just learned. She was older than me. By the better part of a decade. She was just small with big adorable eyes. 

Which meant… well, Sukura thought Aara and I were a thing, and—did I think Aara was cute like that? Sure, she was a little fuzzy, but beneath that she was pretty human looking. I was pretty sure I wasn’t adventurous enough to flirt with a full Gnoll, but for Aara, well…

Food was ready before I came to a conclusion. A sort of oatmeal, though made with whatever the local staple grain was instead. Then some bits of fruit and sugar mixed in. 

I supposed being in the tropics meant that sugar was easy to get here, because one of the few things I knew about historic prices of stuff was that sugar used to be seriously expensive. However, that was in historic Canada or Europe. Not… hm, maybe this area was the most like the savannah-y parts of Africa? So… did sugar grow in Africa?

I kind of missed having a phone and being able to look things up.

Chem finished his breakfast before me, apparently less distracted by questions about the world around us and the world I’d left behind. Which was perfectly fair. So I focused on trying to finish my own meal. 

Until there was a crash from the front entrance.

The four of us rushed forward, Chem grabbing two actual swords as he rushed ahead. He shoved one in my hand, leaving me slightly nervous. Was I really good enough to use one yet?

Reaching the entrance, we found an elf standing there with sickly pale looking blue skin. He was wearing armour that seemed like vaguely Roman armour, but more advanced? The metal of it was a black colour that had a blue-green sheen to it, while the fabric beneath matched his pale skin. He was also holding a sword that was somehow doing the opposite of glowing, as if it could suck the light out of the space around it.

“Vazehr. You’re a hard woman to track down,” he said, while wearing a predatory grin.

“Uh… you’re… are you one of Nemza’s troops?” I asked, realising his armour style did seem kind of familiar.

“I am one of her demon-blooded Janzori,” the man replied, before pointing his sword my way with a flourish that showed he knew what he was doing with a blade. “I’ve been sent to capture you.”

“You do know I’m a goddess, right?” I said, shifting into a fighting stance.

Sure, he clearly knew how to fight better than me, but I figured I could still brute force my way through this.

“Oh, I know. That’s why she made these blades,” he countered, punctuating his statement by stabbing the wall beside him. 

The brick and stucco section he’d stabbed seemed to wither for a few moments, before crumbling to leave a roughly metre wide gap centered on where he’d stabbed.

“One slice from these will drain the life out of any mortal. For a god… my Lady is fairly certain it won’t kill you, but it should be agonizing all the same.”

I paled slightly, not quite sure what to do, when Chem slid between me and the demonic Elf.

“I’ll hold him off so that you can leave,” Chem hissed. “Just… just take Sukura to safety, please.”

“What?” I asked. “That thing’ll kill you.”

“You’re more important than I am,” Chem countered. “Now go. Fly.”

I nodded, retreating with Aara and Sukura towards the back exit. I made sure to keep myself between them and the enemy, at least. I wanted to protect someone.

The Elf charged, ready to ignore Chem, only to be intercepted. Chem’s blade only clashed against his a moment, which was apparently brief enough to keep it from crumbling.

“You’re insistent on this self-sacrifice?” the elf asked as we fled. “How sickeningly heroic.”

I tried to lie to myself about what was going to happen as I burst through the back door. I didn’t want to—

There were more of them back here. A half dozen or so. They were wearing helmets, but from what little I could see of their skin these soldiers looked even sicklier than their boss at the front door. Their blades and armour also didn’t look quite as fancy as his, but the blades had the same infusion of darkness.

As the three of us spent a moment being shocked one of them threw a dagger towards us. I raised my hands, generating a magical shield that blocked it.

However, the dark energy in the blade led to the shield cracking and a wave of pain shot through my arms. The pain dropped me to my knees, and I managed to hold in my gasp of pain as little more than a hiss.

Grimacing, I briefly debated turning around to try out luck with where Chem was. I could still hear the clash of metal back there, and maybe a single more skilled opponent would be easier to deal with…

However, as I spent the moment hesitating, Sukura reached forward and picked up the sword I’d dropped in my pain.

Before I could ask what she was doing she’d rushed ahead and had already stabbed the first dark soldier through the chest. The others seemed as surprised by what happened as I was, which was bad news for them. Sukura had already dashed ahead to slice through a second before the first had begun to crumble to dust. 

The third had time to try to defend himself, but lasted only a few moments before she had him disarmed and then decapitated, a spray of ashy dust flying out from his wounds where blood would have been on a more natural human. 

Sukura then charged to where the two other nearest were, managing to hold them both on the defensive with a display of sword mastery I could do little more than stare in marvel at. I was wondering what I could do to help as she disarmed the one.

Without the deadly blade he was a sitting duck for me to rush in and slam to the ground. Even with the pain still shooting through my body. I heard an unsettling crunch as he hit the ground, and was slightly disturbed to realise that was all it took to cause him to begin to disintegrate. I saw a broken jewel in the ashy dust, and realised that these soldiers worked about the same way as the forces I’d encountered earlier. They just seemed… smarter.

The fifth guard was down by the time I got back to my feet, leaving only one final guard to deal with.

However, he was the one with the throwing daggers, and he’d made sure to put some space between him and us during the melee. I didn’t know if he’d not wanted to hit his compatriots during the scuffle or simply had been trying to conserve limited ammunition, but… right now he had a clear shot at both Sukura and myself. I got the impression he was trying to decide between running or fighting for a moment, but if we charged it was clear what he would do.

I could try rushing ahead, then raising a shield. If I could manage a second time. I felt rather drained of magic from the last time, but there weren’t many other options I could manage.

Until I saw a massive snake rise up behind the man. Its head shot forward, fangs digging into his undead-grey neck. The pain or surprise caused him to drop his dagger, and, the next moment, a lioness burst from the tall grass nearby to finish him off.

I briefly wondered at our luck until I finally noticed that Aara had been chanting in a language I didn’t understand. 

“Sorry that took so long. There’s not as many predators here as in the jungle,” she explained, walking over to Sukura and I. 

“I would say it was quick enough,” Sukura mumbled, watching as both creatures slunk off into the savannah.

I was about to ask about Sukura’s sudden display of sword mastery when she grabbed my hand.

“We need to get going, though. We wasted too much time and—”

What she was about to say died in her mouth as she saw the demonic Elf step out from her home. He had fresh red blood on him, both on his armour and his face. The arm he had been carrying his sword in before was dangling limp, while the terrifying blade was in his other hand. That didn’t do much to reduce the amount of terror he instilled, though.

Especially not when paired with the energy in his eyes, the grin on his face, nor the way he was licking some of the blood off of his cheek.

“Now that. That was a fight. I didn’t think a human could be an actual challenge,” he said, wearing that frightening smile as he turned to us. “And look. You dealt with my men. I was so worried I wouldn’t have any more fun.”

Sukura shuddered, staring at him with wide eyes. She managed to keep her sword ready, however. I admired her for that focus.