The coalescing mana pulsed up above, the water eroding away the earth mana below, as the whole mass became heavier and stronger, a small crystalline core, filled with fluid was created at the center, pulsing itself with magic.

Garble spun around, a tremendous lightning arc as he felled boars. “More and more! I won’t be beat by any boar” Another slice straight through as he picked up momentum. “This fight isn’t a chore, get ready for me en--” He brought his sword up, looking up… and spying a quickly darkening orb of fluid, interrupting his rhyme.

The mana finally coalesced into a monster, the orb erupting into a tremendous mass of mud hanging above the crevasse, and as it descended, a roar echoed in a great bellow, all manner of hooved quadrupeds, horses, boars, deer, and other beasts appearing out of it.

Garble stared wide eyed up, terrified as hundreds of pounds of a moving mud mass plummeted toward him. It came closer and closer, and then he felt a magical grip, and he felt his legs and body locked in place as he was dragged out of place, and found himself standing right next to Spike, who was up on a rock, watching as the mud stampede crashed into the ground where he once stood, engulfing the remaining boars.

The mass of mud pulled up, a part of it lashing forward as a terrible mass of undulating beast parts could be seen in the mass, a deer head here, hooves trampling there, as if the beasts were inside the mud trying to get out.

And, of course, trying to kill the party.

"This is bigger than the last one," quickly blurted out Spike as he clutched his shield and staff, knuckles paling with that force as subtle green energy spread outwards, preparing to heal and absorb the damage his teammates received. "Remember, there is no recall!"

The mud charged at Smolder, an antler lashing at her, and she ducked under it, only to spin and twirl between three sets of gnashing teeth. Mud arced where her tail blade caught the mass, punishing it for getting so close. "I didn't forget, I promise."

Twilight dove for the mass, only to vanish, unwoven mid-charge. Crystal erupted from the ground with a screech of stone grinding against stone, providing a bulwark against the oncoming wave of angry mud, giving a precious moment for the party to charge around it into battle.

The mud slammed into Crystal, a mess of hooves and horns bending around its solid might, but began to flow around the elemental. Tabitha cut an errant hoof, whose mud landed on the ground, which was slurped up by the mass as it moved forward.

Smolder did much the same, slashing at the mud beasts, splattering the limbs and horns and antlers, but the wall of mud was unabated. “Um, are we actually doing anything?”

“It’s gotta take magic to reform after we cut them,” Spike said, healing after some of the many strikes that made it through their defenses.

Tabitha grunted as she deflected another hit. “But it’s clearly not very weak to getting smacked with weapons.” The entire party had to back up as the mess of mud creatures advanced. “Maybe we need a different kind of element.”

“We can’t crack! Now eat my attack!” Garble brought down a column of lightning onto a whole wildebeest torso, the crackling lightning spreading a little, causing the wildebeest to solidify and crack. “Gotcha,” Garble cried, leaning over to leer at the now solid wildebeest, just before the cracked skin of the wildebeest burst open, a smaller but still quite large pair of horns smacking into him.

Spike immediately lept into action, sending a healing pulse to Garble. “So that stopped it… for a moment?”

Smolder licked her lips. “Oh really? Well what about…” She leapt into the air, puffing fire into it and spinning her blades in the flame, bringing the hot blades down onto the mass, immediately drying another section, which she pushed off of. This time it took even longer to reform. “Bingo.”

“Aiden!” Sandra shouted, summoning what was apparently the actual most defensive option of her firebird. “Spread the flames!” she shouted, and Aiden pelted the mass with fire, solidifying full sections.

The mud would burst free from the dried sections sporadically, splattering out dangerously, or even flowing around it, subsuming the cracked earth into itself, but a strategy was found.

A tiring strategy, as the dragons did their best to breathe all their fire. Spike gasped for breath. “I don’t know if I’ve blown as much fire as this before,” he took another breath and shot flame at the wall, which clearly had a lesser effect than the magic-class enhanced attacks his teammates had. “I didn’t realize I could get this tired of breathing fire.”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

Tabitha lept in front of a charging buffalo head, the mud splattering against her shield and knocking her down. “I’m not sure if we’re making good progress…” But as soon as she said that, they caught a glimpse, a bare glimpse, of the world behind the mud creature. It was getting smaller. "Keep it up!" Tabitha rebounded without a beat between, driving against the mud with renewed energy.

However, it had not lost the will to survive, to win. With a great undulation that reached them and past, the mud became part of the ground, upheaving them as the tortured forms of countless animals started to surge up, trying to rip them and beat them where they had stood.

Spike and Garble took flight with equally startled noises. Smolder was left behind, cutting and hacking in a desperate bid to provide enough space to work in. "Snacks up!" She threw a great handful of goodies into the air, unable to look up long enough to aim the shot, just hurling them.

No longer helpful, Sandra let Crystal come apart, rocks falling and fading, allowing the mud past in a wave that threatened to wash her away, but it never reached her. She soared straight up to join the two dragons, her wings wide and flapping powerfully, united with Twilight's essence. Sorry for sending you away.

Is there really no way to warn me? Came Twilight's chastisement, but she was still ready to fight, flowing with Sandra to keep them aloft.

Smolder kept closer to the ground, but swooped up away from the mud as it struck.

But Tabitha was in a much worse position. Her feet sunk another few inches into the mud as she desperately used her sword and shield to beat away its attacks, but it was no use. With no allies and in the epicenter of the mudslide, the creature swirled and flowed it’s way closer and closer, and she took herself a deep breath just as the mud finally engulfed her head.

She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to move. The mud was heavy and pressing onto her. She concentrated on her shield magic, because no doubt it would try to crush or attack her from the inside, and she felt herself swept up in the flow of the mud. But there was a presence, a glow that could be seen from behind her eyelids, and she forced them open. Inside the blurry mud she could see a blue and amber outline, something not quite a sphere but definitely a ball.

And then something else seized her. She recognized the magic immediately and focused her own magic on it, and the loose grip became a firm one, and she felt her whole body lock in place and rip upwards. Soon she was soaring full speed into the air, seeing the mud monster and indeed the walls of the ravine rush past her frozen form, and she suddenly stopped in midair, floating right next to the flying Spike, who reached out to grab her as quickly as possible.

He got his arms around hers, having a hard time with her weight, until Smolder and Tabitha came to the rescue, grabbing other of her limbs, as she hung awkwardly in the air. She exhaled loudly, her eyes burning from the mud and panting from lack of breath.

“Oh oh, we got you,” Spike said. “Sorry, I didn’t even think of that, are you alright? You didn’t swallow any--”

“No,” Tabitha managed to blurt out between deep breaths. But it wasn’t time for apologies or even thanks, as she looked down the mud began climbing the walls, and while it was slowly, it’s churn was going faster and faster. So instead what she said was, “I saw a core in the mud.”

“What?” Spike said.

“A-a magic core, a weak spot.” She gasped another breath. “It’s gotta be near the center, and it might be the actual body of the monster, everything else is just a fancy magical attack.”

“So what, have all the attacks we’ve been using are useless?” Garble groused.

“I mean, we could have carved our way to the orb probably with time,” Tabitha said. “But no, we’ve just been getting rid of it’s ammunition.”

“Which it has a lot extra of from the walls,” Spike said, grimacing.

“What is that?” Garble held his hands out in exasperation. “How were we supposed to beat a monster like that?”

In a moment of insight, the unity of Twilight and Sandra said, “We’re not in the tower, this isn’t a fight created to allow us to finish, it’s a fight that we made by overdosing mana. We could have created a monster nobody could beat…”

Spike cursed, but then caught himself. “Wait, could have?”

The two in unity smiled, and said with two voices, “We’re pretty sure we can blast away the mud, so the core can be attacked directly.”

The moment hung in the air, and Garble thumbed his sword. “If you can get me a clear shot, I can hit em with the big one. I have been itching to use it since Arlien showed me it.”

The churn of mud reached up, creating a pillar that approached them all too quickly. They broke into two parts, Tabitha held up by Smolder and Spike under an arm each. Twilight/Sandra brought their hands together, magic forming brightly. "Time to bring on the heat," they called out in that strange unified voice of theirs.

They focused magic into their hands charging up the starshot, while Garble started his own preparation, flying up higher, swaying back and forth while flying, “Your power is tough, but get ready for ending.”

The unity raised their hands, rune after rune appearing above the battlefield, a tremendous shining purple light above her.

Garble raised his sword too, not stopping his rhyming. “This battle’s been rough, but no one’s pretending that we’re the one’s bending.” He looked down, his sword at the ready as the mud monsters extended further up off of the walls, stampeding straight up off of it.

“Starshot!” Shouted Twilght and Sandra, sending their magic blasting down from the sky with a tremendous crack of magic, blasting into the mud monster with terrific force, blasting Smolder, Spike and Tabitha on their backs from the edge of the ravine, and lancing into the mud monster, driving away most of the mud, leaving a floating amber and blue orb uncovered by the mud.

Garble dove at full speed as magic whorled around the orb, reaching out of it to the mud, grasping at it and desperately pulling toward it, and Garble continued. “We’ll pierce through this foe, it’s you we’re transcending!”

The mud had barely reached the orb by the time Garble’s blade did, as he crashed through it, only small bits of mud clinging to his blade, as he stopped himself, swiping the blood off of the sword dramatically. “So here’s the last blow!”

A crackle of lightning burst at the orb, a peal of thunder exploding out from it.