Mana Reaping

Without hesitating, she rushes headlong through the burned-out thickets. I follow her as best I can, coughing loudly, trying to persuade myself that my meager Alteration skills might somehow help her. Ashes fall around us as we walk upon a white-gray carpet of them, beneath which embers are still smoldering. The Hellequin huntress manifests the idea of water, and a bubble of cold liquid bursts above us, showering us in the process. My drenched clothes immediately start steaming from the stifling heat. Gasping for breath with a stitch in my side, I manage to catch up to her, and she appears to be conversing with a fox. The fox points one way with its snout and scurries away in the opposite direction, while she sets off once more. I surely would've liked to rest for a bit, but time is of the essence.

I grumble and get moving again. We have to put out this forest fire no matter what, before it ravages the eastern slope and spreads to the undergrowth. That's where Yurij's operation and Oowaite's farmstead are... and the village cannot afford to lose them. Suddenly we emerge into an area that appears yet untouched by the blaze. Where has the fire gone? Then it dawns on me as I see a little Jinn floating lazily in the air, near a bed of mushrooms and wildflowers. Was it an act of malice? Who could have dared to summon such an Eidolon during the dry season? I sense the huntress connecting to the Skein and delivering her sentence. Without hesitation or remorse, she draws the Mana from the creature, dematerializing the ideas that comprise it before it can cause any more damage. I plop down on my behind, exhausted and frustrated at having been no help at all.