CHAPTER 24: SPIRAL CANNONS AND SPARTAL BLADES

Stephan didn’t move. A faint curl of amusement tugged at his lips as he watched,eyes unblinking.

"Well... let’s see how she handles that one," he murmured under his breath.

Before them, the searing emerald blast of Destructive Cannon roared across the cracked asphalt, runes swirling at its core, tearing the air itself into heat‑warped ribbons.

But Anna Mary didn’t flinch.Instead, she drew a slow, deliberate breath, the city’s neon glint catching in her eyes, making them seem almost silver.

And then...

Fshoooom!

A vortex of black‑violet energy blossomed beneath her feet, swirling outward like an ink stain spilled on reality itself. Her silhouette slumped, sinking bonelessly into the darkness as if gravity itself had vanished.

The Destructive Cannon tore through the spot where she’d stood a heartbeat before, heat and force rippling across broken concrete, smashing into the far wall in an eruption of dust and emerald light. Cracks spiderwebbed outward as burning fragments of rune‑fire sizzled against the stone.

For a split‑second, silence.

And then....

Krrssh!

Another swirling portal burst open in the air behind Yennefer, twisting shadows coiling at its edges like living things.

Anna Mary emerged, her body lunging forward as if pulled by the momentum of the spell itself, hair whipping around her face, coat fluttering behind her in slow motion.

Her boots slammed onto the asphalt with a low thud. She stood, the smirk on her lips cold as steel, her gaze locked onto Yennefer’s exposed back.

The night seemed to hold its breath.

And above it all, in the half‑lit alley where dust still floated like dying fireflies, Stephan’s smirk sharpened.

"Interesting..." he thought, eyes gleaming with quiet calculation. "She didn’t just dodge... she countered."

"Not bad," Yennefer said, pivoting on her heel to face Anna Mary fully. Her cloak billowed with the motion, and the sickly emerald glow of her grimoire painted cruel shadows across her face.

"Annoying... but impressive."

Anna Mary’s lips barely curved, her eyes sharp as cut glass. "Your magic seems deadly," she answered, voice quiet but edged with steel. "So I can’t let it touch me."

"Then," Yennefer breathed, her voice a low purr, "you’ll have to do your very best."

The air pulsed. The pages of her grimoire flipped wildly, runes igniting and dancing across vellum like living embers.

"Azrael’s Path of Death, Form A ..... Spiral Destructive Cannon!"

Unlike the earlier straight blast, this time a spiraling helix of green flame coiled outward from the grimoire, twisting and writhing like a living serpent of raw destruction. Runes orbited around it, crackling violently; the blast churned forward, ripping apart asphalt in a zig‑zagging path, impossible to predict.

Anna Mary didn’t run.

Instead, her gaze locked onto a shattered traffic sign lying to the side of the alley.

In an instant, a shimmer rippled across her body, the world around her flickered.

Fwhoosh!

She and the broken sign swapped places, the warped metal slamming onto the cracked ground where she’d stood, just as the spiraling cannon incinerated it to molten slag.

Anna Mary reappeared a few steps to the side, cloak fluttering in the heated air.

"Persistent, aren’t you?" she murmured, voice low, breath steady.

Yennefer’s eyes narrowed, green light reflecting coldly in them.

"Try this!"

She thrust her hand outward, and the helix cannon split into three smaller spirals, each twisting through the air on separate paths, converging from different angles toward Anna Mary.

Anna Mary vanished in a blink of violet shimmer, reappearing above on a rusted fire escape.

One of the blasts curved upward, following her.

She threw herself off the railing mid‑air, her body falling in a controlled dive, and at the last heartbeat, swapped places with a toppled trash bin below.

Krshhh!

The blast obliterated the fire escape in an explosion of rust and flame.

Anna Mary landed lightly, crouched, her breath fogging faintly in the night chill, eyes locked on Yennefer.

"I see," Yennefer whispered, her smirk thin and cold. "Your little tricks won’t save you forever."

Anna Mary rose to her full height, her hair settling behind her shoulders.

"Maybe not," she said, voice cool as steel, "but they’ll be enough to get close."

She vanished again in a blur of darkness, reappearing behind Yennefer with a twist of wind.

Yennefer spun, grimoire rising defensively,

A wave of emerald force surged out, forcing Anna Mary to teleport backward mid‑spin, landing atop the wreckage of the smashed car she’d dropped earlier.

Through it all, Stephan never moved.

Still bound by the glowing runes, his posture loose, almost casual. His gaze followed every flicker, every shimmer of magic, each shift in footwork.

"Interesting

," he thought, a cold, clinical curiosity glinting in his eyes.

"She’s more slippery than I expected... but Yennefer’s adapting too."

The alley trembled under the weight of raw power, runes glowing in the darkness, dust swirling around them, as predator and predator clashed, the next move waiting like the cocked hammer of a gun.

Anna Mary’s cloak fluttered in the wind. Her eyes half-lidded, expression almost disinterested.

"I thought you were going to give me a hard time," she said, exhaling slowly, "but I’m starting to get bored."

Then, her fingers moved, calmly,deliberately. She raised her middle finger inward, like coiling tension.

The air shifted.A cold, silent pressure crept in like the calm before a storm. To Stephan, still bound against the wall, it was almost suffocating.

What... is that? he thought, eyes narrowing.

Though he saw nothing, his bones felt it, a hum in the soul, like something sharp grazing the skin of the world.

Yennefer’s brow furrowed slightly. Anna Mary opened her eyes. "It’s time I clapped back."

She snapped her middle finger outward. In that instant, the air cracked. Dozens of invisible blades, thin, impossibly sharp crescents of compressed spatial energy, exploded forward, cutting through the space itself with an eerie hiss, like whispers dragging across glass.

Skit...skit..skit...skit...skit!

Yennefer reacted. "Form A: Azrael’s Halo!" she cried, her grimoire spinning in front of her, pages fluttering violently.

A circular shield of sickly green magic surged out, a halo of overlapping runes etched in glyphs of death, spinning around her like a revolving disc. Each rune flashed, forming an interlocked ward that shimmered with defensive force, like a sanctified ring of executioner’s seals.

The invisible blades collided.

KSHHH!

TSK-KRAK!

The barrier rang like struck glass, trembling from the impacts, cracks spiderwebbing along the outer ring. The rune-wheel held, barely, but with every hit, it began to bulge at the seams.

Thwip!

One single spatial blade, a rogue line of compressed silence, warped sideways and slipped between two spinning glyphs.

It grazed across Yennefer’s cheek, thin but deep, leaving a red line of blood trailing downward. Yennefer’s expression twitched, but she didn’t flinch. Her eyes locked on Anna Mary, burning with a colder rage now.

Anna Mary exhaled slowly. Her hand lowered.

"Let’s see if you can keep up, Yennefer!"

Anna Mary’s voice rang out, sharp, confident, as she thrust her hand forward, flinging another volley of invisible blades.

Fwwsssshh!

The blades whistled through the air like silent executioners. Anna Mary vanished.

A portal spiraled open behind her with a pulse of violet light, swallowing her whole.

Yennefer gritted her teeth, her cloak fluttering from the impact of the incoming barrage.

"Azrael’s Halo — Reinforce!"

She extended both arms as her grimoire surged, and the circular rune-barrier flared brighter. It split into multiple interlocking rings, spinning in opposite directions like a gear system of green light, each ring flaring with new glyphs in fiery script.

The invisible blades slammed against the reinforced barrier, causing it to shudder and crackle like a dying star.

Suddenly...

A portal burst open behind Yennefer. Anna Mary emerged mid-spin, a blade of compressed air wrapped around her palm.

Yennefer barely ducked, the blade sliced a strand of her hair as Anna vanished again.

Above.

Another portal. Anna dropped down like a shadow, both hands extended, hurling two blades straight downward.

Yennefer jumped back, but one blade grazed her shoulder, slicing through her outfit with a flash of red.

She snarled, spinning mid-air, only for another portal to bloom beneath her feet.

"Again?!"

Anna erupted from below, this time kicking upward as she threw another strike, a crescent blade aimed for Yennefer’s lower leg.

Yennefer twisted just in time, the blade missed, but it grazed her thigh, ripping her leggings and leaving a thin trail of blood.

"Damn it...she’s everywhere!"

Yennefer landed, panting, her barrier flickering. Her once-flowing grimoire now hovered erratically, reacting to her panic.

She turned in every direction, but Anna was gone again, the world eerily quiet for a beat.

Then...

"Boo." Anna was behind her, whispering.

Yennefer spun instantly, unleashing a burst of energy, but Anna was already vanishing into another portal, smirking as she faded.

Like a ghost. Like a storm of knives.Yennefer panted, drops of sweat tracing the side of her face. Her barrier flickered, cracked, and then collapsed in a spray of dying light.

She wasn’t used to being on the back foot... not against someone like Anna Mary.

Teleportation. Substitution. Spartal blades... This bitch fights like a ghost with claws.

Yennefer’s lips curled into a dark, malicious smile, eyes now burning with emerald flame.

"Enough."

She held her palm forward. The grimoire floating beside her shivered, its pages tearing open with a howl of wind and magic.

"Azrael’s Path of Death: Form B....Soulbinder Bloom."