"You still don't get it," said Solarel. No sword. No arms. No part of her that did not burn with pain. 

But in this moment she was still a God.

"You think your wandering eye is a flaw?" she said. The Hybrasilian pronunciation is off, her voice is shaking and her tribal accent is creeping through. "It's a strength. It's a freedom. I am stuck in a battle I can't move on from. It made me blind. It made me weak. It made me lose the [i]Aeteline[/i]. The fact that I'm here before you now is because I've sold my soul and mortgaged my future for another chance at this."

She stepped away from her own wreckage, stepping on her own broken sword arm. A mad confidence boiled within that motion. Flames trailed from her wrecked arms like wings, and the black cockpit eye of the Bezorel gleamed in the reflected fury of the Fang.

> thank you for taking me seriously
> thank you for using this blade against me
> thank you for using your secrets on me
> thank you so much

"Everyone else I can blind," she said, voice soft and tender. "I can trick. I can impress. I can transfix with reputation and rhythm. It's like dancing with myself. And I don't want that for you, for us."

She came closer, just outside the arc of that massive energy sword. She was tiny against it. Insignificant against it. It burned away the whole world, a sword made for her alone. Her ears were filled with alarms but the only thing they heard was Mirror's voice. Her eyes were filled with warning sigils but all she saw was her destined defeat. Her throat was filled with smoke but it tasted like cinnamon. Spirits and Geists fled the Bezorel like rats deserting a sinking ship. There had never been anything more inevitable.

She should be honoured to fall to such a blade.

But she couldn't.

That was the temptation that lay behind so many of her victories. Maidens fell upon her blade for no other reason than that it was glorious to do so. They realized inevitability and surrendered to it and battle became a mere organizing principle. 

One last Geist left the Bezorel. It flowed into a missing part of the Gods Smiting Whip's pattern. It settled into place and then the lights went out.

The Fang That Devours the Sun went dark. The Gods Smiting Whip's joints locked into place. That entire goddess froze from the bite of a flea. And the Bezorel stepped closer, into land previously rendered sacred by the sweep of a divine sword.

"Do you know what I need?" said Solarel. 

She had no arms, but she didn't need them. She was bejeweled in flamethrowers. They ignited, reaching out in a tender embrace to wrap around the Gods Smiting Whip.

"I need you to check for this," she whispered. She took a step to the side, tracing her flamethrowers across the Whip's breasts, down along its hips. "I need you to know that I'm capable of it," she continued to circle, running her flamethrowers tenderly over the Whip's butt and up along each tail. "I need you to comprehend the exact threat I present. I don't need you to be blinded by me, I blind everyone. I want you to fight me with open eyes." 

She leaned forwards, through the flames, to touch her cockpit against the Whip's. Gently, forehead to forehead. Through the glass ahead her eyes were closed and she was smiling. "You almost did. This was my final trick. You might even escape it still." The flames wrapped the frozen Whip, warm and strong against the cold, and the Bezorel stayed close in that embrace. "I don't want everything, Mirror. All I want is the space I am worthy of."

[Fight: 8
- Take a string
- Take a superior position]