Wheeeee flying no this is serious business. Brenda flies up towards the roof with everyone else.

Then just as she follows Terendelev in through the newly expanded hole in the third floor windows, she and everyone else can get a fireball to the face. It doesn't exactly do anything to any of them through protection from fire, but when it comes to greetings it's the thought that counts.

"I see you decided to skip my little surprises. Well, it's no matter; at least you brought Terendelev this time, so she'll have front row seats to the lot of you dying. Jeslyn, be a dear and keep her busy while I deal with the rest of these crusaders, would you?"

Not waiting for her to finish speaking, a woman with pointed ears and an incredibly ominous scythe speaks a word and doubles in height, which allows her to stop Terendelev's charge as Minagho starts to cackle derangedly.

Some of Brenda's powers are consistently subtle; Battle Maiden isn't. As soon as the fight starts Brenda's movement through the air goes from inexperienced to graceful and competent. Instincts blossom in her mind, knowledge of air resistance and angle of attack beyond the need for words.

Jeslyn is not the biggest asshole with a polearm Brenda has stabbed this week. If you limit the category to assholes with scythes, she's actually the smallest.

Jeslyn seems to twist unpredictably, and the blade that was supposed to slide straight into her instead cuts into her side. With the help of Battle Maiden, it's easy to see that she's cheating somehow; she's reacting to Terendelev's blows before they even happen, and chance is tying itself into knots in her favor. It's not really enough to let her outfight either of them, let alone both, but she's making a valiant effort. Apparently she didn't catch the fight with Deskari, though, because she also tries setting swarms of insects on Brenda and Terendelev.

As soon as the bugs and Brenda's own dodging make it hard to see her she's wearing a veil again. She grabs at Jeslyn with all three nonsword arms and tries to hold her still so she can't do the precognitive dodging thing.

She’s really quite good at evading grapples, apparently!

… Less good at doing that and preventing Terendelev from going after Minagho, since the advantages offered by her size seem outweighed by the fact that whatever protection she has going on against stab and claw wounds doesn’t seem to apply to grappling.

”Quit grabbing me!”

When her words fail her, she switches tacks and calls down a pillar of divine fire on the both of them, half of which goes straight through Brenda’s protection from fire.

The fire hurts, though it may be hard for Jeslyn to be sure of that because Brenda's clothes aren't even singed (and are instead growing nomex linings). Grab grab STAB grab KICK and do the sounds from behind her indicate a change of focus is necessary or can she just keep doing this?

There's the sounds of a very angry dragon and more of the same eerie cackling Minagho was producing earlier, but there aren't any shouts of panic. At about the same time she shakes off the pillar of fire, she'll also start hearing Aranka start singing; the sound carries surprisingly well despite the battle din, and just the sound of it helps Brenda fight better and leaves Jeslyn even more frazzled.

"Fine, you want to grapple? I'll just make you regret it then."

Her right hand suddenly glows with black flame.

"Die."

She can't take too many more hits like that and stay in the fight. She raises the sword again, brain searching furiously for any advantage, anything she can use to tip the scales--

And the sword shines with divine light, not the soothing glow of before but a blast of radiance.

A pillar of light strikes down far faster than Jeslyn could possibly dodge, slamming her flat onto the ground and then through a new hole to the second floor of the building; the blast is bright enough to briefly outshine the sunlight coming in through the shattered windows. Through the gap in the stone, she can be seen lying spread-eagle on blackened scorch mark outlining her now steadily shrinking body while wisps of smoke waft off of her.

Holy shit! (Metaphorical shit but literal holiness!) She did not know it did that! She spins to join the main fight, taking in everyone's positions and levels of injury.

Terendelev is currently in the middle of dragonhandling Minagho, though she has some concerning looking red marks running across her body; they look like what Irabeth had after being grabbed by Minagho's tail. Hulrun seems entirely busy trying to kill a Nabasu, while Irabeth and the paladins are locking down a trio of Minotaurs, Ramien is playing keep away from some mad... chemist? throwing around acid and fire everywhere, and the mercenaries focus on crowd control and keeping the Babau and Incubi away from their archers and Ember.

Overall, it could definitely be going better - most notably, they seem to have some bards and archers of their own going almost entirely unmolested and Hulrun's complexion has looked better - but it doesn't look like anyone is dead yet and Minagho looks a lot less happy than she was half a minute ago.

How about some of those bards and archers get tied up in melee, then!

Since they're mostly Cambions, they do not like this at all! The abyssal huntresses have the skill and durability to not instantly go down, but there are only two of them and the shock enhancement on their weapons doesn't seem to work too well through the nomex. Some of the braver incubi try to step in with their scimitars but they have a rather hard time hitting her even when she's not actively dodging.

Stab stab stab punch she should really see about getting a second sword, she's getting better with practice and she's got all these hands. Now that Cambion's scimitar is her scimitar. Stabstab stabstab stabstab.

Unlike the first big fight against demons Brenda got into, these ones don't have Deskari waiting in the wings to punish them for disloyalty and any attempts by Minagho to accomplish the same role are stymied by the fact that she's manifestly in no position to do so. Once Brenda takes down the first abyssal huntress, the second one teleports away, and this sparks something of a rout among the other demons as about half of them pivot from trying futilely to stab or slash her to trying slightly less futilely to run away.

Yes, good, go cause problems or better yet don't cause problems somewhere else. 

She would be surprised if Minagho herself gave up that easily, though.

Then if she just focuses on the ones sticking around, she can pretty quickly clear out most of the rest of the mob of demons, and move on to the bigger threats. Does she have an opinion on which ones should be made to stop first?

She's going to help Terendelev beat up Minagho; taking out the leader might get the rest of them to see sense, or at least feel fear.

Minagho has enough situation awareness to see Brenda coming and redouble her efforts to slip free, but escaping from a gargantuan dragon once they have you pinned is one of those things that is much easier said than done. She tries again to teleport, even knowing that it's hopeless, but unsurprisingly fails again.

"No! This can't be happening!"

Really when you think about it stabbing Minagho in the face is bringing her closer to having a normal number of face holes wow she needs to have fewer random shower thoughts during swordfights or at least ones that are less horrible. (Stab slash stab slash.) 

There's a moment when Minagho's wounds look mortal, then there's a flash in which her appearance is momentarily overlaid by that of a graying man and her injuries vanish.

"What do you want? Wealth? Power? Just let me live and I'll grant it! Just name your price, please!"

?!?!?

Brenda isn't dumb enough to trust the offer but neither is she so lost in the dance of combat that she won't be brought up short by 'please.' She hesitates.

"Do you want a wish? A profane gift, far superior to that of a mere succubi? My loyal servitude? I'm a Lilitu and a witch, there are few who could offer you more than I can!"

Brenda stopping, even just for a moment, seems to have merged her terror with a sudden desperate hope.