--- Lily --- Marigold, Blue, March, Romilda


    Blue was shocked,pletely unprepared for an attack like this. Though… just because she was unprepared didn''t mean she was off-guard. Blue had been waiting for something, and she reacted automatically in the face of a clear threat. Her hands shot out, twin whirlpools that had been tightly bound for some time, released straight in Lily''s direction ready to tear their way through the construct.


    The water did so without issue… but of course the form was made of shadow, so while the whirlpool drilled through it, the shadow simply kept moving. None of the mana focused in the water was trying to stop it, instead it was ineffectually trying to grind it down. Blue wouldn''t be able to react in time to get up a proper shield, the attack would go through…


    But Lily wouldn''te out unscathed either. Lily hadn''t intended for the whole construct to be solid. She just wanted it to berge and imposing, so to save mana she''d only properly empowered a small part. That small part was the ws and they were moments away from slicing into Blue''s flesh. At the same time, the whirlpool drills were moments away from inflicting a simr fate on Lily.


    Neither mage had time to properly think up a counter for the oing attacks so when they made contact the damage was significant. Blue had managed to raise an arm to try and block some of the damage, and it worked. She had a deep gash on her forehead and matching deeper w marks running across her arm… but her chest was unscathed and the blood loss was manageable for now.


    Lily wasn''t quite so quick on the uptake. The water charged into her with most of the force remaining. It dug into her sides and felt a lot like someone was trying to clean her fur with sand paper. The water pushed that fir down and into her skin, where it was spun rapidly causing a rash across arge area, and puncture wounds in the centre of it.


    ''Luckily'' the drills hit bones quickly and those were pretty solid, weathering the storm somewhat.


    Soon the power around her dispersed and the two mages were able to get a good look at each other. Blue was covered in a good deal more blood. Her right arm was close to useless and the blood was leaking from her forehead. Both issues Blue could somewhat mitigate underwater, but problems nheless.


    On the other hand, Lily looked a lot better but there wasn''t much she could do for her problems. Her body was asionally racked with spasms courtesy of the holes in her sides. The that had been rubbed into her skin was barely noticeable with her fur to cover it… but she couldn''t really mitigate her issues at this point.


    Perhaps a bit of paper over the wound site to keep the blood in, but she wasn''t losing all that much for some reason, so it didn''t seem like a big issue right now.


    "That fucking hurt Lily," grumbled Blue as she cast the closest thing she had to a healing spell. It was called ''water bandage'' and while it did heal you… eventually it wasn''t fast in the slightest. It gave her a slightly boosted rate of natural regeneration and kept all of her blood inside her body. That was about it.


    Useful sure, but the injuries weren''t going to magically vanish without Ellenell to heal her.


    Lily grinned back at the words, showing off her sharp teeth. Not really sure what else to do. It wasn''t like she could easily talk back as a Memphis. Instead she just summoned up a shadow w from behind her back and flexed it menacingly in Blue''s direction.


    The whirlpool attack had pushed her out of range unless she wanted to waste a lot of mana and really thin down her shadow to the point it wouldn''t do much… but Blue probably didn''t know that yet.


    Behind them, Lily could hear another fight going on. March and Marigold had apparently managed to get close to each other and the shing of steel was clearly audible from where she was. If Lily turned around, she would see Marigold trying to stab March with a spear, while March tried to deflect it as much as possible and close the distance between them while her teleportation ring recharged.


    Back to Blue who was grimacing when the toll from mana expenditure started to catch up to her. The whirlpool spell was expensive and very distracting for March and Marigold, it was perfect for them… but the whirlpools she''dunched at Lily were a lot more expensive to cast in exchange for being cheaper to keep around and she''d used them to… honestly pathetic affect.


    On top of that those bandages were another drain on her mana. Not a major one, but it was all adding up. She was currently debating if it was time to drop the whirlpool or not.


    With Lily here, she couldn''t really afford to be wasting mana… but at the same time, with Lily here she really couldn''t afford for Marigold or March to join in the fight against her. One would be bad enough, but if both decided toe after her? That was a problem just waiting to happen. Blue cursed the nes that reduced the water pressure and allowed everyone to breathe.


    It really was a massive blow to her power under the water.


    Lily on the other hand… really didn''t know what to do at this point. The surprise attack failed and she didn''t want to get in close to Blue, rightfully scared of what those whirlpools could''ve done if she was closer or they had a bit more force behind them. At the same time, if she stayed at range she had nothing to attack with.


    Her paper just couldn''t function properly underwater and her shadow could only stretch so far.


    That left Lily''s options quite clear. She could get in close and use her shadow. Turn and run as best she could, probably towards Marigold to use the confuse that fight was generating… or try out one of her treasures and hope for the best. *The only two that I can see being useful right now is the lightning rod or the boat.


    The boat because it can be a big obstacle between me and Blue, allowing me to escape, approach, and maybe hide away within. The lightning rod… well that one speaks for itself.*


    Lily bit her cheek as she considered her options but when Blue started to summon up a new set of sigils Lily decided to act. It might be a dumb idea… but she didn''t want to run, and nothing seemed like it would be better. The world seemed to slow down once she''d made the decision.


    Lily swapped back to her human form and pulled out the rod, activating it in one swift motion while pointing it towards Blue.


    Lightning exploded from the tip and shot straight into the fae in front of her… and all of the water nearby. Shit. Lily felt pain wrack her body as the lighting seemed to just keep going. Sure the initial burst had connected to Blue, but the rest? It seemed like the rod was trying to pump as much lightning into the surroundings as it could.


    Even when the damned thing finally cut off, the water was still charged and Lily felt her muscles twitching all over the ce. The hands that had been holding the metal pole were burnt and the rest of her body wasn''t all that much better.


    Blue wasn''t in a great state either. The Lightning had hit her dead on and then exploded across her body. She was covered in thin burn marks across most of her body and the front of her outfit had a hole burned clean through it. Blue''s skin was charred at the entry point and it really didn''t look good. If Thyme wasn''t around to fix all of this it would definitely have scarred.


    Luckily, the water bandage spell had helped to bleed off some of that energy, but perhaps not enough.


    Lily was about to try forcing herself to do more… when she felt the need to turn around. Lily did her best to force her aching body to move. Only to see arge fist approaching. That zap from the lightning rod? It had gotten Blue to drop her whirlpool spell. Instead of wasting time brawling with Marigold, March had taken the chance to blink towards Lily and attack her.


    Lily summoned up as much paper as she could manage in that instance… and it still wasn''t enough. March''s punch met Lily''s face with the force of a freight train and before she could so much as blink, she was in the hospital with a female nurse Thyme looking over at her with a clipboard. "Hello and wee to medical. I''m afraid due to the timing, this means you''re officially out of this round…"