"Go ahead, try it out!"

I carefully clenched and unclenched the fist of the metal arm. I suppose it was my arm now. It still felt like it couldn't possibly be mine, but it responded as if it had always been part of me.

I gently rested my hand on the ledge, and I noticed a little bit of steam hissing out of the arm. I could barely see gears spinning within it. Watching it at a distance, it reminded me of the motion of construction equipment, only much more fluid.

"How did you make this so quickly?!" I asked Chiara in awe.

Chiara blushed. "I was a mechanical engineer back when I thought I was human. As a giant it's actually far easier for me to build things—I'll put together the general structures in my true form and I'll shrink down to tinker with the details."

I put my hands together, realizing it was the exact size and shape of my other arm. "And how did you get the measurements so accurately?" I wondered.

"I took a casting while you were sleeping," Chiara confessed, "so I measured that and multiplied by nineteen—my true form is exactly nineteen times larger than my human form, and I had a feeling the same would be true for you."

"And you said it'll grow and shrink with me?"

"It should, yes! I haven't figured out the pattern for what grows and shrinks and what doesn't, but these materials have all worked well before." She paused, as if searching her memory. "Oh, yes, you should try the blaster!"

"The blaster?" I asked, perplexed.

Chiara grinned. "I found out after a long time that my growth is fueled by an energy that's constantly burning within me. You have that too, and if you have the right technology you'll be able to release it!" She pointed her finger next to her eye. "Here, watch!"

And Chiara's hair started to glow and billow, and both of her eyes lit up brightly, as they had when she saved me from the Godslayers. She turned, and two beams of energy shot out from her eyes at the wall—which exploded. There was a deafening boom, and rocks came tumbling down, landing at our feet.

Chiara turned back to me and smiled. "Now you try! Start by extending your arm."

I did as I was told, reaching the arm forwards towards the new crater in the wall.

"Spread your fingers and put your palm at a 45-degree angle," Chiara directed. "Then start focusing energy into your hand."

And I did. I was surprised by how easy it was, but it felt almost instinctual. I heard a hum coming from my hand, which seemed to be rising in volume as the energy charged. And based on the flashes of light in my peripheral vision, it seemed that my hair was glowing and billowing, just as Chiara's hair had.

"And release."

A burst of energy shot out of my hand, hitting the wall. To my surprise, it was all gone instantly—I wasn't able to sustain a beam as Chiara had done with her eyes. And so the blast knocked me backwards, and I stumbled and fell to the floor. Falling at this size felt as if I was caught in extreme slow motion, but it didn't hurt any less.

Chiara instantly offered me her hand and pulled me up. "I'd say that worked perfectly!" she exclaimed, happily gesturing to the enormous cracks that had opened up in the wall around where my blast hit.

I rubbed the back of my head. "I guess I need to work on my balance, though," I realized.

"You know what, you're absolutely right!" Chiara exclaimed. "Moving around as a giant is quite different from how it is at human size. You need to be aware of your momentum—you won't be able to slow down easily, and quick movements can throw you off balance." Her face lit up as if she had an idea. "And I know exactly how you can practice. We'll need to be at human size, though—so blast me."

"Blast you?!" I asked incredulously.

"It's easier than trying to hit myself with my eye beams. That's what I've had to do until you showed up."

"Wait, is this the only way to shrink?"

Chiara nodded. "If you take a hard enough hit, your body is destroyed and you're left with a smaller one. So you were small when I found you because you'd lost your arm. It usually doesn't hurt, though. So go ahead, on three you can blast me and I'll hit you with my eye beams, okay?"

I was absolutely not comfortable with this, but I didn't want to make this any more difficult, so I obeyed. As soon as we were both ready to fire, Chiara counted down from three. As I unleashed the energy from my hand into Chiara's stomach, I felt Chiara's eye beams hitting me in the chest. And she was right—as my body disintegrated, it didn't hurt at all. Seconds later, I found myself at human size on the floor, with a human-sized Chiara grinning at me from a distance away.

"See, that wasn't so hard, was it?" she laughed. "Now come on, let's head to the city."