# Chapter 22: A Desperate Defense
The heat was a physical blow, a furnace blast that threatened to sear the air from his lungs. But the grimoire's glow was a beacon, a promise in the heart of the destruction. Behind him, he could hear the snarls of the Fenrir wolves closing in on Pres, the sharp crack of her gunfire, and the distant, commanding roar of their Alpha. He was abandoning her to save himself, to save the book. The thought was a shard of ice in his chest. He took one last breath of the comparatively cool night air and plunged into the flames. The fire roared, a hungry beast, and for a moment, he was certain it would consume him. But as his fingers brushed against the grimoire's leather cover, the inferno parted. The flames did not burn him. They bowed to him, whispering secrets in a language of ash and embers. The book flared with light, and the world dissolved.
He was not in the bar anymore.
He stood in a vast, starless void, the air cool and still. Before him floated a figure woven from moonlight and memory, its features shifting yet undeniably familiar. It was the face from the grimoire's portrait, the First Alchemist. His ancestor.
*You are running out of time, little spark,* the figure's voice echoed not in Relly's ears, but in the core of his being. It was a voice like grinding stone and flowing water. *They are not just hunters. They are erasers. They will unmake you, and everything you touch.*
"Who are they?" Relly asked, his own voice a whisper in the emptiness.
*The Concordat. The Sanctus. The same. They believe power is a river to be dammed and controlled, a legacy to be hoarded by the worthy. They are wrong. Power is a sea. It cannot be owned, only navigated. You have been trying to build a dam with your bare hands.*
The figure gestured, and images flooded Relly's mind. He saw the grimoire's pages not as text, but as living blueprints. He saw the transmutation of water to whiskey not as a simple change, but as a complex reweaving of molecular bonds. He saw his electrical blast not as a wild surge, but as a clumsy, catastrophic release of ambient energy, like tearing a power line from its housing.
*Your power is tied to your will, but it is fueled by your understanding. You fear your emotions because you do not understand them. You see them as a storm. You must learn to see them as the wind. You cannot stop the wind, but you can build a sail.*
The vision shifted. He saw a woman, her face a beautiful, cruel mask of ambition. The Silhouette. He saw her kneeling before a council of vampires, offering them the secrets of Alchemy in exchange for a twisted form of immortality. He saw her betraying the First Alchemist, her hands stained with his essence. The betrayal was a physical pain, a phantom wound in his soul.
*She is what happens when the sail is torn,* the First Alchemist's voice resonated with sorrow. *She seeks to consume the sea, to drain it for her own power. She will come for you. She believes your lineage is the last, great cup from which she will drink. Do not let her. The grimoire is not just a book of spells. It is a key. It is a shield. It is your birthright.*
The light of the figure began to fade, the void collapsing around him. *Remember this. The first principle of defense is not to block, but to transform. Turn their strength into your own. Now… wake up.*
Relly's eyes snapped open. He was on his hands and knees on the floor of his burning bar. The grimoire was clutched in his hand, its leather warm but not hot. The fire still raged, but it felt different now. Distant. He could feel its energy, its chaotic dance of heat and consumption, not as a threat, but as a raw, untapped resource. The knowledge from the vision was settling into his mind, not as memories, but as instincts. He understood. He finally understood.
A crash of shattering glass ripped him back to the present. Two figures, clad in the same black tactical gear as Cassian, smashed through the front windows. They moved with a liquid, inhuman grace that was utterly terrifying, their movements too fast, too precise to be human. They landed in a crouch, their featureless helmets turning in unison to lock onto him. The red glow of their optical sensors cut through the smoke like malevolent eyes. He was cornered. His heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat of pure adrenaline, but beneath it, a new, cold clarity was forming. The First Alchemist's words echoed in his mind: *Turn their strength into your own.*
He scrambled backward, his hand knocking against a half-melted shelf. His fingers closed around the neck of a bottle. Macallan 18. A good year. A terrible waste. But a principle was a principle. He rose to his feet, the heat of the fire licking at his back, the two hunters advancing with predatory slowness. They were toying with him, savoring the moment.
He didn't focus on the bottle. He didn't focus on the alcohol inside. He focused on the concept. *Volatility.* He thought of the chemical bonds, the potential energy stored within the liquid. He thought of the oxygen-rich air, superheated by the fire. He thought of transformation, not as a grand act, but as a simple, elegant nudge. He pushed his will, not as a desperate shove, but as a focused, needle-sharp point of intent.
The bottle in his hand began to hum. The amber liquid inside shimmered, its color deepening to a violent, angry red. The glass itself grew warm, then hot, but it didn't break. It was changing, becoming a vessel for something far more dangerous than aged whiskey.
The hunters paused, their heads tilting in unison, a gesture of unnerving synchronization. They sensed the shift in power.
Relly didn't give them time to react. With a roar that was part defiance, part terror, he hurled the bottle.
It didn't shatter. It detonated.
The explosion was not a simple fireball. It was a concussive blast of pure, alchemical force. The hyper-combustible liquid erupted in a shower of sticky, white-hot plasma that clung to everything it touched. The two hunters were engulfed, their black suits instantly incinerating. The air filled with their enraged, non-human shrieks, a sound of digital feedback and animal agony that was far worse than any human scream. They thrashed in the alchemical fire, their forms dissolving into ash and melting circuitry.
The blast had blown a hole in the back wall, revealing the dark, narrow staircase leading down to the basement. It was his only way out. He didn't hesitate. He scrambled through the jagged opening, the grimoire held tight against his chest, and plunged down the stairs into the familiar darkness.
The basement was a sanctuary of shadows and clutter, smelling of damp earth, stale beer, and forgotten things. Old kegs were stacked like monoliths, and broken furniture created a maze of obstacles. He landed heavily on the concrete floor, his ankle twisting painfully. He bit back a cry, stumbling forward into the gloom. From above, through the hole in the floor, he could hear the fire raging, and beneath it, the horrifying sounds of the hunters. They weren't dead. Their shrieks had turned from pain to fury, a promise of relentless pursuit. The sound sent a primal wave of fear through him, confirming his worst fears. He wasn't just fighting men. He was fighting monsters, and he had just made them very, very angry.
He had to move. He had to hide. He limped deeper into the basement, his hand trailing along the cold, stone foundation wall. The grimoire pulsed with a faint light, a guide in the oppressive dark. He remembered the First Alchemist's words again. *The grimoire is a shield.* He needed a place to use it. A place to think.
His fingers brushed against a section of the wall that felt different. The mortar was newer. The bricks were cleaner. He pushed. A section of the wall groaned and swung inward, revealing a narrow, pitch-black space beyond. A false wall. An old secret he'd never known. He squeezed through the opening into a cramped, forgotten space. The air was stale, thick with the smell of dust and disuse. It was a dead end. A trap.
He could hear them now. They were in the bar, their heavy, rhythmic thuds on the floorboards above. They were searching. They would find the basement. They would find the false wall. He was out of time, out of magic, and out of options. Panic began to claw at the edges of his newfound clarity. He was going to die here, in the dark, buried under the rubble of his own life.
No.
The word was a spark in the darkness. He looked at the grimoire, then at the brick wall of the hidden compartment. He couldn't fight them. He couldn't outrun them. But he could transform. He could change the battlefield.
He pressed his palm against the rough brick of the inner wall. He closed his eyes, ignoring the sounds of the hunters descending the basement stairs. He reached for the fire's energy, for the structural integrity of the building, for the very concept of 'solid' and 'stable'. He didn't have much power left, but he didn't need a grand display. He just needed a single, precise command.
*Fall.*
With a deep, grinding groan that shook the very foundations of the bar, the ceiling of the hidden compartment collapsed. Tons of brick, mortar, and the wooden floorboards from the bar above came crashing down. The sound was deafening, a roar of destruction that swallowed the hunters' surprised shouts. Dust and debris filled the air, choking him, forcing him to his knees. He was buried alive.
But he was alive.
He lay in the suffocating darkness under the rubble, the grimoire clutched tightly to his chest. The sounds from the bar were muffled now, distant. The hunters were either buried or forced to dig their way out. He had bought himself time. Precious seconds. He was trapped, wounded, and exhausted, but he was alive. And for the first time since this nightmare began, he felt not like a victim, but like a survivor. He had defended himself. He had used his power not as a wild, desperate flail, but as a tool. A desperate, terrifying, but effective defense. He closed his eyes, the grimoire's faint glow a small comfort in the crushing dark, and waited.