Chapter 543: Smoke Moth

Arc jumped as she heard the door slam open, looking around for anything to arm herself with and finding nothing. She knew her body wouldn’t last very long with enhancement magic, given how tired she felt and how much blood she’d lost when her throat was slit, but she could sense whatever was coming had its intent specifically on her.

She’d only get one enhanced punch to-

"Arc! You in here?"

"Owyn?! How’d you follow me?" The moment he stepped around the corner, the sense of familiarity through the string between them made itself felt.

"The entire time we were shooting, you seemed frustrated. You wanted to help. I figured... You knew a way to," he gestured around.

"Yeah, I know a way to. But my Father’s a fucking dick," she gestured at the lock, quickly explaining the metallic expression of his paranoia. "What I don’t get is what a cube has to do with Smoke."

"Smoke?"

"My rifle, remember? You know, like smoke moths?" Smoke moths were slightly fire-aspected insects, supposedly from outside the Veil before migrating in, and they were called such because they generated smoke as they ate, which deterred most predators. They’d been a bit of a pest until the Foresters figured out a way to balance them out.

Owyn shrugged; the cube symbol on the lock was clearly as much of a mystery to him as it was frustrating for her. "Maybe it has to do with the locker?"

"That’s not how my Father works. And I don’t have time to just guess." To compound her luck, turning the lock back to the front showed that the entire set of wheels was set to the number six.

"Then maybe we should go. That monster is fighting right outside."

"No!" Arc shouted. "I know Smoke can kill that thing. I just need... Ugh!"

Owyn stepped forward and placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. "You’re hurt. Someone else can take care of it. Let me protect you."

"I DON’T NEED PROTECTION!" Arc screamed, hating that she could feel the pain she’d just caused him. It was a different sort of pain, and she couldn’t push it out as well with him right next to her. But she also couldn’t stop. "So help me, or leave me alone!"

She felt his intent to punch and instinctively ducked as his fist slammed into the locker above her. "What the fuck are you doing?" she asked as he punched again.

"Helping," he grunted. "What the fuck is this thing made of?" He wasn’t even leaving a mark, except perhaps for adding bruises to his hands.

It wasn’t long before Arc told him to give up. "It’s got to be magically reinforced. The only way in is through this thing... and it’s got to be about Smoke."

Owyn leaned back against the wall, nursing his already-wounded arms, which were almost back to normal except for the shallow, angular lines where he had bled, now extensively scabbed over. "What if it doesn’t have to do with your gun? You said it’s a cube, so... what comes in cubes?"

"Lots of things!" Arc tossed her hands up. "Boxes are cubes. Books, I guess. Some magic formations."

"Do any of those things have to do with your gun? Or maybe... what if it’s for you?"

"What about me is cubic?!" Arc challenged. "It should be something I’m supposed to know, because it’s my gun." She planted her head on the locker, staring down at the one thing keeping her from making a difference.

No one she knew outside her family used gunpowder weapons. Why would they? Caster rifles were more versatile, didn’t require much cleaning, and most people could put mana into something built for it.

Before things got bad between them, she’d spent hours with her Father as he showed her all the ways he could make bullets do what magic did, even if they were more limited.

If she could just get to Smoke, she knew all of those bullets would be there. Anko had cleaned out all her magazines... Wait!

Inspired, she started turning the wheels, spelling out the word M-A-G-A-Z-I-N-E-S. Nine letters. She tugged the lock...

The only click was the metal bolt against the locker as the lock refused to open. But she wasn’t going to let that stop her. What else has to do with guns and has nine letters? Gunpowder!

Gunpowder failed.

She tried Arcsrifle, which failed too.

Every moment spent guessing, she could feel more people getting hurt outside, along with the pain and fear of those sheltering inside the building.

"Arc, please... You tried your best."

Those four words tugged at the very depths of her shame. How often had she heard that from her parents when she failed? When she just couldn’t do what her siblings could. What most people could.

Even her only magical outlet, her enhancement abilities, fell short compared to the requirements to become a Knight, much less a Dragon Knight, which required distance casting.

She knew she had to do better, or she’d be forever stuck relying on her family. No one would trust a failure like her with a dragon. She remembered the words her Father seemed to always say... and hated them.

You tried your best, Sugar Moth.

Sugar...

Click!

Through her tears, some sense guided her fingers to those two words. Sugar Moth. Her Father’s nickname for her, though all her parents had picked up using it. It was first given when, after getting her wings, her developing lack of appetite turned into a need for sugar to get her through the day. It was part of why she liked moths, because like her, they needed sugar to live. And like them, she somehow avoided negative effects from such a strange diet.

The moment the lock fell away, she wiped her eyes and reached for Smoke. At the bottom of the locker, a box held all the magazines she’d had and a few more. And she recognized her Father’s hand on the labels for each row.

Regular. Rubber. Low-Grain. Tracer... Where were the armor-piercing rounds? Lifting the first few boxes, she found armor-piercing rounds and grabbed a box of them along with some high-explosive and incendiary rounds, quickly slamming a magazine of armor-piercing rounds into Smoke and chambering the first bullet.

"Grab the rest, I’m going to find someplace to shoot from!" Holding Smoke ready, she sprinted through the hall and back upstairs, spending some mana to enhance herself just enough to endure the pain in her chest from her cracked and bruised ribs.

When she got to the section where the others had been shooting from, she found it completely wrecked, open to the night air as her ex-grandmothers fought it just beyond. The monster seemed confused and disoriented, but the back and forth of their battle still caused immense damage to the nearby structures.

Arc chose a chair and leveled her rifle across the remains of a windowsill as she brought it to bear on the monster. In her hands, Smoke somehow felt... alive. Or not alive, but rather more connected to her than she’d ever felt before. It felt right. Now she just needed to connect a bullet to the horse-thing’s brain.

She took a shot, and the creature’s left arm got in the way. All she accomplished was leaving a smear across its crystalline armor. Even as attuned as she felt, Smoke bucked against her shoulder, causing her significant pain as some of the force went to her damaged ribs. She bit back a scream and chambered the next round.

Dammit... The monster’s movements were too erratic. It took a second deflected shot for her to realize she could feel its confusion, and what it intended to do wasn’t what its body responded with. Rose’s mouth was moving the entire time, and Arc remembered that bards were experts at sustaining spells to mess with the senses.

Unfortunately, it was also messing with her shot thanks to whatever new ability she’d developed after nearly dying... but the fact that she had something new she could do with magic gave her a certain strange joy. She just needed to figure out how the strings actually worked. And so far, all she had to go on was intent and... emotion!

The very second Owyn arrived, one arm laden with the ammo case while his other awkwardly held the caster rifle he’d been given, Arc shouted, "High explosive rounds! Give me a magazine!"

He faltered for a moment before electing to place the box on the nearest desk and searching as she held out her hand. Seconds later, she received what she asked for, though she still checked the tips to be sure, and once she had them, she dropped the armor-piercing rounds and replaced them before firing once, twice, three times...

The first round, the armor-piercing one remaining in the chamber after the switch, proved it could go deep as it landed in the monster’s chest. She ignored the bucking of Smoke and the pain as she emptied the entire ten-round magazine to get its attention, which she did when it gave a raucous shriek that hurt her ears to hear this close. Then it charged.

The shriek was stunning enough that she lost a second before slamming the magazine of armor-piercing bullets back into place, and that mistake caught her precious distance as it galloped in the direction of its greatest pain, gathering itself for a mighty leap.

The moment Arc read that intent, she knew... No bullet would stop that mass if it arced toward her, and she was too tired and too slow to focus fast enough and speed her way out of its path.

In the face of her own impending death, for the second time that night, Arc despaired.

This can’t be the best I can do...