Chy hid behind a large boulder, the very same she had fought the Shi Master next to 3 days ago. Well, technically she’d battled him 10 minutes from now, but it had been three days from the point she’d been sent back to.
She knew that this battle would happen at the same place, at the same time. It was too major to change, it could mess up everything in the space-time continuum if it did. Even if she could, she didn’t want to change it. She knew! She knew exactly what the Shi Master was going to do. That way, she could counter everything he did--and win!
She peeked around the corner with her slightly tilted eyes. Her skin was slightly dark and her hair almost pitch black. She was short, much shorter than the Shi Master, but back in her home country, Ta’akon, she was considered above average, even tall.
She checked around the boulder again. He’d show up any minute now, wondering where she was, then she’d use Nature on those scraggly trees on the mountainside to attack him, then--
Pain sprouted from her shoulder. She grabbed her arm and barely stifled a scream. Her entire right side had gone numb, much more than what should have happened with a regular wound.
Chy turned around weakly, almost stumbling over. Behind her stood the Shi Master, wielding a stone dagger. Crafted with Space, it was probably chock-full of Pain, which had given it the extra punch. He eyed the dagger analytically. “Hand-to-hand combat is just so much more fulfilling, isn’t it?”
She reacted quickly--well, as quickly as one could with only one usable arm and leg. “Shadar Sharath,” she said. Sharath was the Ancient for Space, Shadar told what she wanted to do with it. The large boulder next to her lifted to smash the Shi Master, but he simply waved his staff and took over control of the stone. That staff made him so strong!
“Now, that simply won’t do.” He tossed the boulder over the cliffside, only seconds passing before Chy heard the loud crash of it landing on the rocky field below. He pointed the staff at her, and a wave of Pain ripped down her throat.
He looked at her objectively. If he hadn’t been her mortal enemy, she might have found him handsome, if only mildly so. Dark, wavy hair with sharp blue eyes, he wore the black robe that most wielders of the Aspects wore, including Chy herself. Tall, muscular, and with a square, defined face, he towered over her, both in size and in strength. And with that sharing Staff, in power as well.
“You know,” he said, “you could join me. Fighting, leading, taking over the world, we could do it.”
Chy couldn’t voice her reaction, so she showed him what she thought of that offer: she spat on his face. He wiped the bloody spittle off his face and shook his head. “I didn’t want to have to do this.” He drilled his staff toward her, unleashing its full might on her body.
Wave after wave after wave after wave of Pain smacked into her, forcing her back against one of the scraggly trees, useless to her now.
“Oh wait, no,” he sneered, “yes I did.” He took the sharpened end of the Staff (it had come back in time with him, so it was still pointed from the last battle) and stabbed it into her heart. Somehow, it was worse than every single Pain wave combined. It seemed the pure Aspect of Pain radiated from that staff and into her chest. She knew she had only seconds to live, that she had failed, and that he wasn’t going to give her another chance this time.
But suddenly, the Pain wave from the Staff stopped and she gasped for breath. The pain wasn’t all gone, but he had stopped using it, and now she was just numb. Just as suddenly, a wave of Time crashed into her and once again she was sent back to try one more time.
