I stared at the hanging figure for several subjective seconds, forgetting the world around me, as foolish as that might seem, given that I was amidst thousands of enemies. I was trying to make out their features, see if it was anybody I recognized. The distance between us made it difficult for me to make out more than the crown and encroaching black, but the mist was a dead giveaway; either that was the Shadow Faced Guy and he had a new hat, or he was sending another weird proxy through.

My own pulsing red energy continued to snap around me, smashing any enemy that edged too close back and into the ground with enough force to rip them open and break stone. As I continued to wait, confident that my crimson lightning and Instinctive Precognition would keep me safe - for the moment - I watched as red lines, deeper in colour than my own began to flicker into existance; at first, they appeared one at a time, linking the figure in the sky to something on the ground for so short a time that even I found it hard to follow. But then the flickering accelerated, one became many and then tens, hundreds and finally thousands of thin tendrils came into existence and then faded as, with a strange kind of spiritual pop, the army around me suddenly burst into motion.

Distracted by the abrupt change around me, I turned my attention away from the hole and its occupant to glance about myself, seeing the figures in grey moving at almost the same rate as the members of the sects I had seen making their way towards me had been; it was not fast by my standards, but it was considerably faster than they had been.

The surrounding crowd did however begin to move in concert, their motions measured and calculated so that they made their way closer and closer to me, using their fellows as cover against my energy, though they did it at such a crawl that I would have had to wait for relative hours before they managed to reach me. Still, the sudden change was disturbing and I had to guess that it had something to do with the red filaments, and the man in the sky.

Looking up again, I was in time to catch the figure step out from the hole and for it to snap closed; the figure was moving at least as fast as I did, though he did not have the fast-forward effect that my time dilation leant me as he fell. That means he was a Pinnacle, though perhaps only a mid-Pinnacle.

The figure vanished from view, falling behind the obscuring bulk of the Stone and a moment later the same pale green light of the wards flared, brighter than ever, perhaps even brighter than when they had been under the combined assault of the Sect elders. There was not much I could do, as long as the wards held; they should have either destroyed or repelled the crowned figure, but they seemed to be staying put; I had no such confidence that I would be able to do the same, or even that I would be able to do anything if I could.

Frustrated, I turned my attention back to the army and began to take it out on them once more, smashing them aside and avoiding their newly combined efforts to fight me; they seemed able to see my movements now, but their bodies were simply incapable of keeping up, even if they were much faster than they had been.

As I waded through them, I saw the giant form of Reff appear a short distance away, his molten form forcing back the onrushing mass of mottle-clothed humanity as dark smoke billowed lazily into the air, the heat of his unrestrained presence igniting those closest to him instantly.

I saw a flash of familiar light nearby, and I saw a fast-moving dwarf slam to a halt in front of a Blood Guard and smash the woman in red and white off her feet, though she seemed otherwise unharmed. The dwarf moved about the Guard slightly faster than a Foundation stage, at my guess, and while he did not seem to be causing a great deal of direct harm, knocking people off their feet disrupted their lines and if he kept it up, they would eventually be overwhelmed.

Shifting my focus, I dashed off to give Gan another taste of my new and improved lightning. Knowing the man was mostly intangible when moving, I waited for him to come to a stop and crashed into his side, my freshly healed fist smashing into his smug face, even as crimson blossomed around the blow; I watched in morbid curiosity as the destructive power stripped flesh from muscle and cracked bone, the combined force of the punch and the energy flipping him end-over-end, his head hitting the stone of the square just as light began to blossom. Though the stone shattered, the dwarf’s motion ceased and seemingly without effort the man began to flip to his feet.

Not interested in a prolonged fight, I used my now much faster movement to lift my leg and bring it down in an axe kick that should have smashed the little man back into the ground with one less intact spine, but instead my leg passed through him to crater the ground and I found myself dodging an incoming fist, smug smile turned furious on the fop’s face.

The counter did not hit; the first time we had fought, my best was about in-line with his, but I had made some incredible strides since then, and I avoided the blow with relative ease. Gan’s movements between blows were still blindingly fast, even for me, which was impressive, but he seemed to have to slow down to actually hit, and that meant he was outclassed. Stepping around the blow as he landed, and before he could flash again, I twisted my whole body into a wild haymaker that would have been laughingly easy to dodge if I was not moving much, much faster than sound. As it was, my fist impacted him with every bit of force I could muster, at least without using my echo ability; it sent the dwarf catapulting into the arms of the crowd, knocking them off their feet as he was driven through their ranks. He did not get up again, at least in the short time I was watching.

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That did not prove as long as I would have liked; I would have preferred it if I could have confirmed he was out for the count, but instead I was distracted by the re-emergence of one of the sect elders, their tiny form locked in a grapple with a man in red and white and whose body seemed to be banded with lengths of bright violet metal, polished to a mirror finish.

The two of them seemed to be evenly matched as they took turns forcing each other to smash back and forth, their movements leaving deep gouges in the ground, and causing it to tremble, almost in time with the flashing from the Stone’s wards.

Not wanting to get involved in that particular fight – knowing that while I was pretty fast, I was not yet that fast and even a casual blow from one of them would likely kill me – I turned to find my friends, but was only able to see Reff as he slowly stomped and kicked his way through the crowd. I hope they were all ok; it was difficult for me to really judge how fast the army was moving after their boost, but I knew that Toria was still very likely injured, and that speed had always been something of an issue for Riffa, though her vastly improved control and coordination with her clones had minimised that weakness substantially since the first bout she and I had shared.

I was moving towards the even-more-giant form of my friend when an explosion expanded in slow motion to one side, sending the combatants there staggering. It seemed to be caused by rapidly expanding steam rather than a chemical reaction or anything like that, and judging by the volume it appeared to be what was left of an iceberg.

Turning, I took the better part of valour and ran away; one nearby Pinnacle level struggle was one thing, but it would be all too easy to get sandwiched between two of them, and I had no intention of getting crushed like a bug.

I was about half-way to my friend when there was one final flash of light, and the green wards that had been visible since the arrival of the red crowned figure – possibly the Shadow Faced Guy – simply ceased. The disappearance of the wards – which had seemingly withstood the assault of multiple Pinnacle stage cultivators – shocked me enough that I came to an abrupt stop, staring at the blank stone of the fortress.

As I stood stock-still, a ripple traveling fast even by my standards passed to one side of me, cutting dozens of our enemies in half and progressing until they hit the structure before dissipating. Turning to the source, I saw Tain running in the bloody wake of his attack, quickly passing by me and leaping to the roof.

I was about to follow – despite a warning from my Instinctive Precognition – but was distracted by the sight of a swarm of daggers bearing down on my position. Frustrated at the continual distractions – it turns out giant battles are pretty confusing places to be – but remembering the last time I had seen such a thing, I gritted my teeth and decided to leave the roof to Tain. Running towards the daggers, I stepped around them, dodging from side to side while looking for their controller, the Risen Throne member from the hidden base I had fought days earlier. I spotted the man, who was pointing in my direction and bee-lined towards him, eager to demonstrate my newly elevated competence. I made it within a few feet of him when Instinctive Precognition tapped a warning on my mental shoulder and I found myself kicking out, spinning in mid-air to the side before dashing closer again.

I could not see anything that had caused me to dodge, but I had to guess that it was the same invisible barriers that had caused me so many issues the last time I had met Dagger-Man. I had no idea where their creator was, but the last time we had met she had been marginally faster than me, at least in laying the frictionless walls down, but I was considerably faster and it seemed I was much better equipped to avoid them.

I closed with the man whose name I could not remember quickly; I was moving twice as fast as he was, so the surprise on his face at my avoidance of the transparent wall and my approach was almost comical in its build-up, culminating in a long step and a straight right into his nose, flattening the thing instantly and sending another enemy flying backwards into the crowd. I pursued this one, as there were no immediate distractions to prevent it, though I did have to dodge several more sudden barriers, including ones that coated the ground and would have absolutely proven to be a potentially insurmountable problem for me, if not for my advanced warning.

Unfortunately, as I reached him, still lying on the ground and seemingly unconscious, I found myself unable to finish him. Instinctive Precognition warned of the wall as I approach, and I attempted to come at him from another direction, but as I circled his supine form, I discovered that he was surrounded on all sides by the barriers, and though my red lightning clawed at it, even the destructive energy was unable to find purchase.

Growling in frustration, I looked around for the source of the walls, but despite knowing that she would almost certainly require line of sight, I was unable to locate her in the tumultuous melee. Still moving constantly, so as not to be caught in a frictionless cube of my own, I reluctantly backed away, taking the opportunity to take a few dozen low level fighters out of the battle, before turning and continuing my journey towards Reff.