Gods, I savor the sting in my hand, the tingling feeling on my skin that lets me know I put everything into that slap. The fog melts away from me, leaving me standing in a vacuous circle in the middle of the rune platform. Heat touches my skin, gifting me a feeling like tiny rivulets of water running over my skin as the cold disappears. My smile is wide, but I can’t help it. Coriander is gone, and a disintegrating tunnel through the mist shows the direction her body went sailing.

Galea appears in front of me, flinching at the sight of my manic violence. “I cannot find her,” she says to me.

“That way, from the looks of it,” I say, pointing at the tunnel through the mist that is closing in on itself.

I look down, seeing Jess laying against the stony steps that lead up toward the tower. She is unconscious and a bit beaten up. I scowl at the tunnel through the mist as it collapses and stalk toward Jess. Hovering my hand over her mouth, I find that she is still breathing, a good sign.

“Are you able to keep track of anyone in this fog?” I ask Galea, adjusting Jess so that she lays flat on the stone.

“No,” the dragon affirms.

“Dammit.” I linger for a moment before standing and turning toward the fog that closes in on the little bubble I have made. “Time to–” My thought is cut off as a giant charges out of the fog, directly at me. The man is easily seven feet tall and has a shaggy mane of green hair. His hard features are pulled into a snarl as he races toward me, his arms wide, as if he wants to sweep me up in a hug.

There is no chance I am letting that giant get his massive arms around me. I duck his first attempt to grapple me, jumping back and calling fire to my hand. I pause, dragonfire roiling in my hand, unsure if I want to burn this man. I don’t know him. I have no problem with him.

He lashes out with a blind kick while I hesitate, and I barely manage to turn the strike on the staff in my hands. Coriander’s white light continues to linger in the head of the staff, preventing me from truly making it my own once again and using it. My block proves too simple for the giant. He turns his missed kick into a spinning backhand that knocks my feet out from under me. I fall on my back, already rolling to avoid the stamp of a huge foot on my torso that shakes the stone.

Regaining my feet, I decide to let this man have what he is so plainly asking for. My first Dragonfire Bolt stops him dead in his tracks as he tries to rush towards me, exploding in his chest and leaving a smoking scar behind. He snarls, but I have already thrown three more blobs of dragonfire at him, each exploding in a smaller concussive blast. The man staggers, trying to pat out the orange flames that eat into the silk robes he wears. I continue to make space, channeling another bolt as I back to the end of the platform.

“I am not here to fight you!” I yell at the man, but he doesn’t hear me over the fire eating into his clothes.

The man growls, tearing off his burning robes, leaving him standing in nothing but his undergarments. I can tell by the look on his face that there is no chance to speak with him any longer. When he charges again, I hurl a more charged bolt at him, hoping to blow him down. It only begins to occur to me now that I have no idea how to beat someone without killing them. To my shock, the man throws his left hand forward, his palm reaching towards the ball of fire. I cringe away as the explosion engulfs the man in fire and smoke, not wanting to see the exploded remains of the man’s hand.

Again, my ill ease at facing another person in combat rather than a monster turns on me. Charging out of the smoke comes a man made of metal, his body smoking as he runs me down. The metal giant’s left hand is a ruin of scrap metal. I try to conjure more fire to me, to juke to the side to avoid the bull bearing down on me, but the giant only steps into my own path. A massive right hand swings at me as I pour a plume of fire into his face.

The sound of ringing hits me, and I realize that I am suddenly weightless. The metal giant shrinks into the distance. I am flying through the air. It is only when the fog takes over me that the pain reaches my head, a concussive wave that makes everything else seem insignificant. My feathersteel armor still ripples with the ringing blow the man’s metal hand made against my chest. My useless body flips in the air, my shoulder colliding with an unknown combatant out in the fog, sending me to spiral. Then, my back crunches into something solid, something made of stone. My head snaps back, and I am gone.

The sound of scratching and the distant echo of exploding magic drags me out of the darkness. A wetness on my hand drawls my attention. I try to see what is there through the blurry haze in my eyes, the world slowly forming from the indistinct colors around me.

I lay on a floor of stone, no trace of snow or ice anywhere. A fireplace just above me blazes with heat, banishing the cold and fog that persist just outside of the room’s open exterior. A forge looms past me, its instruments scattered all around me: two sets of worn tongs, a nice hammer, a rusted iron vice. A small man crouches in the room near me, his hands working feverishly to remove a ring from a hand. I then realize that it is my hand he is working at.

Pulling away, I try to yell at the man, only to find I have no breath. I try to breathe, the muscles in my chest fully uncooperative, and manage a stuttering gasp. The world starts to swim once more as I flail onto my back, trying to suck in air. The unknown man, his features indistinct, drops on top of me, settling his considerable weight on my chest. I can’t hear what he says, nor do I care.

A piece of wood, maybe a staff, but I can barely make anything out, crashes down into my face. My eyes whirl about, unfocused. Pain erupts in my nose as the heavy weapon lands on me again. A spurt of blood sprays into the back of my throat, and my body spasms as another blow falls on me. Terror and pain push me to the edge, and as I lay in that well-lit room, some unknown man raining blows down on my face, I let go.

My hands scrape out, fumbling over whatever clothes the man is wearing, fire springing up inside of me. I pour flames into him, over him, using all of my power to turn my attacker into a burning matchstick. Another blow lands on my face followed by another. Then I begin to hear the screaming. The weight in my hands struggles, trying to get away, lifting and dragging my body along with it as it stumbles and tries to run. I release whatever I am holding, falling to the warm floor once more and spitting blood onto the floor. I hazily make out a bonfire sprinting out of the room, terrible screams of panic and pain cutting into the air. Finally, I suck in a hitching breath.

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My entire world swims as I push myself to my knees, snorting blood onto the floor. I lose no time in channeling twin dragonfire bolts into my hands as I try to get ahold on my breathing. A head-splitting whine pierces through my brain as my nose snaps itself back into place a good minute later, the rest of my disfigured face knitting itself back together. I lever myself to my feet with the help of the anvil, the world slowly turning into something intelligible. Looking around, I find that there was a single wall inside this misplaced forge. A crushed tool board hangs there on the wall, a vacant spot and a splash of blood telling where my body had collided with it.

“How long was I out?” I ask Galea.

“Two and a half seconds,” the dragon spirit answers.

Through the fog outside, I can see signs of magic exploding into the air. Moreover, despite the persistent haze, I can see the outline of soul presences battling against each other, some managing to suppress others to an extent, others existing comfortably inside another. The colors of the presences are unique to each, a flair that identifies the magician as much as their name does. I had seen Kendon’s in the fog for a moment, but the man was gone when I arrived. The thought brings back to mind Coriander’s surprised face just before I slapped her with all the magical force I can manage, and the image brings a smile to my bloody face.

That won’t have been enough to put her down. Jor’Mari had mentioned to me before we dove into the fog that he suspected her of having a high defense to magical attack. Apparently, that was common among mages–another thing that no one informed me about. I could feel it as my hand made contact with her face. She will be wounded now, but by no means down and out.

Just as I am readying myself to step out of the forge room, the sound of gong cuts through the battle. Sounding as if Exeter himself dropped a metal bowl, the grinding noise of metal revolves once, twice, three times, before pattering to a stop. For a moment, the battle freezes, everything falling silent. A wave of released tension shakes the ground, nearly knocking me off my feet, as the gong rings once more. The hair on the back of my neck stands on end when I realize the source of the noise, the tower.

Wind as fast and hard as any I have ever felt blows through the forge room, snuffing out the fire in the hearth. Someone cries out in the distance, but the screaming of the wind tears away everything else. I notice motes of the fog blowing past me, traveling along with the wind toward the tower. By chance, I notice something rattle past my foot. I lunge forward, scooping up the Lamplighter’s Charge before it can be sucked away into the building storm.

The air clears, and I watch as the last remnants of the fog are sucked away by the wind down and into the open doors of the tower, as if the entire structure of smooth and ancient stone were taking a breath, readying itself to speak. Slowly, I climb back to my feet, looking out into the suddenly clear courtyard along with everyone else. There are so many of us inside the confines of the stone walls now, some unmoving on the ground, but most still managing to keep their feet. Three or so people ignore the proceedings, kneeling over the injured, pouring their mana into them.

Galea begins to project windows into my mind, picking out people scattered among the battlefield. She brings my attention to Jor’Mari, one of the few others that is ignoring the sudden lull in the combat, repeatedly hammering punches into a man’s stomach before tossing him aside.

“”Hold!” a voice calls over the courtyard. Eyes turn to a man Galea identifies as Graessa Mor stepping away from people surrounding him, holding his hands up for everyone to see. “This violence has reached its natural end. Any further bloodshed is for naught, the path forward has been opened.” Behind the man, more people begin to slowly file into the courtyard, looking around at the display of violence with fear in their eyes.

In the absence of the fog the smell of iron starts to come to me, undercut with the cool clean smell of the ice. People linger on the floor, holding their injuries, moaning out their pain.

Another voice rises, that of a tall woman in flowing robes–Thaniel Cape, the daughter of a Duke and the only noble born inside the courtyard prior to the battle erupting. “You would speak of peace now?” she asks into the stillness. “After you attacked us, unprovoked?”

“The alliances that we hold in this contest are fickle ones,” Graessa says, inclining his head to the woman. “I am not so tied to the actions of my betters here in the same way I might be in the outside world.”

“That may be true for you, but we are clan,” the woman says, gesturing around. “You attacked us!”

I ignore the rest of the conversation as Galea picks something out for me in the midst of the battle. Stepping out from the forge, I hurl a ball of concentrated fire through the battlefield, its fiery flight noticed by an exhausted audience as it approaches its target. Coriander, she is so far away that I cannot see her expression, but I doubt she is pleased to find herself attacked as she skulks against the far wall. A bolt of black lightning crashes down from the sky, colliding with my fire in the middle of its flight, stirring an explosion of orange fire and dark power that scorches those too close.

When the smoke clears a moment later, I see Kendon standing in the center of the explosion, wings of shadow spread about him, a great green shield held in his hand. He stares at me as I begin to run through the courtyard, hurling another ball of fire; there is no recognition in his eyes, only vacancy.

“My knight!” Coriander calls out as my second ball of dragonfire races towards her. Kenden soars backwards through the air, plucking the woman from the battlefield before my dragonfire can engulf her, spiraling up into the air and toward the tower.

My feet are a blur on the icy stone beneath me as I chase after them. I manage to fling two more Dragonfire Bolts their way before they disappear into the gaping maw of the tower, vanishing into the dark. Feet are moving around me as I sprint for the tower, people stirred into action once more, a mad cacophony of violence picking up. My eyes are so steady on the tower ahead, I hardly register the swing of a sword for my leg, jumping over the woman holding the weapon as I speed along. Those closest to the tower take their chance, sprinting up the stairs to get inside as quickly as they can ahead of me. A flood pours up the stairs, moving into the dark behind the open tower door.

Galea points out a man standing at the bottom of the stairs, his eyes focused on me. Just enough awareness is left in me to ignore the clogging pathway of the staircase and turn to run toward Jor’Mari who waits at the bottom.

“It looks like you managed to land a blow or two,” the man says, smirking at me.

“They are getting away!” I yell back. Conflict has started again in the courtyard, but most attention has been turned towards storming the stairway. Jor’Mari spares a glance to the staircase before lacing his fingers in front of him, making a step for me.

“Step up,” he says.

I don’t think twice before I put my sturdy boot into his hand. With a heave, the man tosses me like a ball into the air. Flying through the air, my balance is as slippery as an eel, and by the time that I reach the top of the staircase, it is all I can do to grab the lip of the railing. Others dash into the dark ahead of me while I pull myself up. Fire rings my hands, forcing others to shy away from me as I sprint into the tower ahead of them. I will not let them get away from me!