The volcanic rock that filled the mountains on the western edge of the borderlands would fare well in the fire.
Nothing else would.
And they'd be stripped bare.
But they'd still be standing above the destruction of everything else.
There'd been great fires in the history of the Rock. Eirian had read about several. the fire that had burned the White City on the western coast a hundred years ago. Or the occasion fires that swept through the farms of the Hearthland and resulted in booming growth several months later.
Chenzhou and Mingzhe were slowing down.
Their faces were stained black with ash around their mouths and noses.
Even Fleet Goddess was struggling to breathe as the air got thicker and heavier.
Was there really no hope?
Was everything, everyone, just going to end here?
The part of Eirian that was always ready to fight screamed 'no' as loud as it could, but it was slowly being suffocated by the heat and weight of the fire, now so strong and bright that it looked like midday at midnight.
Everything she'd done, everything she'd suffered, and it all ended here? She wondered as the flames crawled closer.
Everything she hadn't done? Hadn't experienced, had suffered or learned or tasted or felt or found, lost, and found again?
And it ended here?
That was it?
Eirian screamed, so long and loud her lungs burned and her lips split.
It startled Chenzhou and Mingzhe, who turned to her in surprise. Their eyes were bloodshot, the vessels burst in the heat.
Was the whole world going to end here?
It seemed ridiculous to think the thing that was going to finally end all life was happening in her lifetime out of all the thousands of years the Rock had existed.
Oh.
It came to her with an odd softness. The gentle realization of the piece she'd forgotten about.
What had Death said?
"You will have to earn your way home." He'd said. "You will have to undo the damage you did when you left."
He'd been talking about the veil, though Eirian didn't remember damaging it in particular. It seemed ridiculous that just walking through it could do so, but magic was as moody as people could be.
Tearing open the veil had allowed them to leave, to allow them to enter the world of the living.
Even now, she had a hard time seeing how that could have been a bad thing.
But apparently, it had caused some kind of damage she couldn't see.
Was it related to the fire?
No, there was no way. Fire was dangerous enough on its own. It didn't need magic to burn the whole world.
…
It didn't, technically, need magic to stop it either. Nature would eventually take care of that itself, maintaining the true balance no matter what humans wanted.
…
But…
Eirian had to do something to earn her way home. To make up for what she'd done.
Something great.
And great things were often terrible.
Could she stop the fire?
Her magic was impressive. It was immense and forceful, but how did that help?
A wildfire was the same, and unlike her magic, it answered to no one.
Her magic was fire most of the time, and using fire to put out fire didn't work. It just grew and multiplied.
Wind would only spread it faster, and she wasn't good enough with water to summon enough to make a dent. She couldn't move enough earth without killing just as many people, probably.
The wildfire was thousands of li wide now. Most of the borderlands were alight, they'd lost most of the villages and camps, and so many people that they'd struggle to rebuild for generations.
If they ever did.
Entire tribes were gone, all their knowledge and history with them, and none of it would ever return.
So much had already been lost.
A shadow moved in the corner of her eye.
Death.
All Eirian had to do to go home when it was her time was stop this wildfire. Do something that only creation itself has ever managed to do.
Maybe…maybe the answer lay in not stopping the fire at all?
Eirian carried an ocean of fire inside her, had done so since the day she'd been born…
Maybe it wasn't a matter of stopping by erasing but by absorbing.
If Eirian could contain an ocean, she could contain a wildfire.
Right?
She turned to Chenzhou and Mingzhe, the only two still waiting for her. "Go."
They didn't move.
"Go!" She snapped so viciously that it made them jump.
"What?" Chenzhou and Mingzhe shared a confused look. "Are you not coming?"
Eirian straightened her spine, put her shoulders back, and prepared to fight. "No."
"I don't understand," Mingzhe admitted while Chenzhou sputtered. "Do you have a plan?"
Eirian bit her lip, then nodded. "I think so, but you need to go."
"Absolutely not." Chenzhou snapped, eyes wide with fear. "I am not leaving you here to die."
"I might not die." Eirian offered, because she certainly didn't want to. "But I have to try, and you have to go."
"How?" Mingzhe demands, just as terrified as Chenzhou.
Eirian didn't answer, wasn't sure she could even explain it if she had the time.
Behind Chenzhou and Mingzhe, Death smiled.
Eirian turned back to the fire. It felt strange facing a fight without drawing Ardain, but there was nothing the blade could do.
Instead, she looked for her magic, found it waiting as it always was, just under her skin.
~tbc