The earth wave carried hundreds of warriors, and from what Yuriko could see, they were mostly human. Each wore deep green tabards, with a sigil of a silver barked tree bare of any leaves. She could even see the Sorcerer, Rhain, in the middle of a formation. His eyes glowed with a multi-coloured hue, a mixture of browns and greens, with a spider’s web of black. Those eyes stared into Yuriko, even from a distance of several hundred paces. “Give it to me.” The words couldn’t have reached her, but she knew what he said from the movement of his lips.

Yuriko glared, face impassive. But that only seemed to egg him on. She didn’t know if the wounds she gave him had healed since his body was covered with robes. She could see tightly wound brown tendrils, tree branches of vines, underneath though.

“Do we fight?” Riley asked quietly.

“We’re outnumbered,” Aidan said evenly.

“But there are only two Knights.” Layla addedsardonically, “Bravado and stupidity.”

“We’ll show them what happens when they mess with the Empire,” Riley added, voice now dripping with eagerness. “Cousin, you don’t have to hold back.”

“Huh. Ah, yes,” Yuriko spluttered.

The genteel veneer dropped from their faces, and their light shone with bloodlust of equal measure.

Layla pulled a small cylinder from her belt and depressed a button. She returned the trinket back in her pouch and pulled out a different one. This one was an orb made out of roughly hewn stone. She channeled Animus into it.

Riley, for his part, inserted a fresh cartridge into his Plasma Caster, then aimed at Rhain. Before he could shoot, the Sorcerer was hidden from direct view, either the warriors interposed themselves, or his platform smoothened out.

Aidan had already started to generate his plasma balls.

Yuriko held out a hand and called Fri’Avgi out of her Anima. She fed her with Animus and Radiant energy, watching keenly as the sunshards formed from the central gem. There was something tethering the shards to the gem, a strand of Animus thinner than a hair strand. ‘So that’s how…’

She didn’t catch how the sunshards were formed though, but that was fine. How she managed to control the shards merely by thinking it had puzzled her more.

While she was distracted, the earth wave lowered to ground level and unleashed the tide of warriors. She expected crossbows and arrows, but instead, gouts of flame, shards of ice, and careening stones shot at them.

“Arise!” Layla yelled as she hurled the stone sphere in front of them.

A ripple went through the dirt, and up into the hill. The overhang groaned ominously and dust fell from sudden cracks. The rock shattered and was drawn towards the sphere, and a rampart three paces high rose in front of them.

It wasn’t fast enough to intercept the energy bolts and Yuriko brought the second dance to the forefront. The shards, seven in all, spun and intercepted the attacks, even as Aidan’s plasma balls moved to intercept.

“Watch out, Chaos!” Aidan swore when one of his balls collided against a shard going for the same fire bolt. The plasma popped like a soap bubble and Aidan’s face paled.

“Sorry!” Yuriko yelped. But she couldn’t say anything more as the enemy was upon them.

“Die! Die! Die!” Riley yelled from atop the rampart.

Crenellations formed on the platform, allowing him to duck behind it. But most of the time, he let his Protective Field take the damage. The purple light rippled alarmingly after getting hit once, and at that time, he ducked for cover. A few seconds later, the Field stabilised and he was back out, shooting.

The rampart was completed after a minute. An eternal moment with fire and hail striking down. A dome started to form over the platform, which was just big enough to fit all four of them. Still, Yuriko felt constrained. She didn’t have a ranged weapon…wait…

With her angry Will, she sent the shards flying out. They halted roughly twenty nine paces away and Yuriko pulled them back. The range was too short. No matter, those rotters were running towards them.

The flames splashed against the rock harmlessly, as did the ice shards. The stone bullets chipped Layla’s rampart. And after the initial salvo, the Tiathans focused on shooting rock bullets. The ambient Chaos churned at the flagrant expenditure of Animus, and Yuriko could see the miasma swirl as Rhain did something.

“We can’t let the Sorcerer do what he will,” Yuriko yelled, trying to be heard over the staccato sound of pelting rocks.

Layla had her hands pressed on the platform, eyes crossed with concentration. She didn’t answer.

“What do you suggest?” Aidan asked.

“Attack!”

That seemed to take both of the brothers aback.

“Er, sure?” Riley muttered, “Isn’t that what we’re doing?”

“No, we shouldn’t huddle like this. That Sorcerer took down a well defended fort with his power.”

“Well, you should’ve said so earlier,” Layla groused. “Hang on.”

She stood up and fished out a stick, er, a wand, from her satchel. Like all of her tools, this one was covered in runescript, and to Yuriko’s Chaos senses, she could see a glimmer of the spellweave within.

With a wave, the dome that had just covered the rampart blew off. It was eerily silent but once the rock was several paces away, it shattered into tiny fragments and rained down on the approaching warriors. Yuriko winced at the screams of surprise and pain. A crimson cloud of blood spattered outwards.

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Her path was clear.

Yuriko leapt off the impromptu tower and charged, Fri’Avgi held up high, and the sunshards darted towards the sides. The rays of the second dance countered the stones shot her way, though she felt the impacts slowing her down imperceptibly, and she could feel the circulation pattern within her jolt. She had enough mastery of it to force it back into shape but she’d lost a bit of Animus in the process. Three lumens worth, probably. In the process, she had blocked dozens of projectiles.

A few moments later, she noticed Aidan running after her. Surprisingly, he was just as fast as she and held a lancet and a side-blade in either hand. Five violet plasma balls orbited around his head, deflecting any bolts that came close to his face. He let his Protective Field take in the rest.

Raaah!

The opposing humans roared and in unison, split into two and parted around the two of them. They kept out of reach, near a dozen paces away, at least. When her shards cut them down, they gave her more space. In the process, they kept peppering them with stone bullets. Some of them reported back to their arrows and crossbow bolts. The shots were angled down, to avoid hitting their allies in the crossfire, but that only made it easier since she only had to jump and leap.

Before she knew it, a lance of solid ice careened from the back, and only a desperate twist of Fri’Avgi prevented it from hitting her Anima.

“YOU! You killed Eoghan!” the ice queen from the battle of Matahil screamed.

Her hair was in a frazzled bun and there were bags under her eyes. A strange looking image of a blue barked tree, bare of any leaves, hovered above her head, and a cloud of icy mist streamed around her.

Yuriko wanted to bypass the woman but she wouldn’t let her. The ice queen shot more icicles at her, some striking her Anima and causing it to crack.

But Yuriko wasn’t alone. A purple plasma ball intercepted an icicle, causing both to dissipate. Aidan used his Lancet to create more balls and then spun them defensively around the two of them.

Yuriko took advantage of the lull and sent the sunshards at the woman, who squealed and sent a cold wave at them. The shards flickered as the cold sought to overpower the Animus construct, but Yuriko felt a force of Will emanate from the artefact. The shards vibrated in a high pitched keen and somehow, it negated the cold wave. In the blink of an eye, all seven shards punctured the woman’s chest. Ashes and steam burst from the wounds and the woman toppled back, her lips groaning out with the fireboy’s name, Eoghan, before the light faded from her glazed eyes.

Yuriko barely spared her a thought. As far as she was concerned, they attacked her first. It was self-defence.

Her enemies seemed to reel back, and there was a collective gasp.

She charged towards the swirling ambient Chaos, and they got out of her way. That didn’t mean they stopped shooting at her, though. No, they kept a healthy distance. But anyone who came too close got a sunshard through their torso or their head.

She was done playing nice.

They’d attacked and attacked her, and they wouldn’t let her be! She was already leaving! Why?

With a hoarse growl, she leapt at a clump of archers and cleaved them in twain before they could react. The third dance enhanced Fri’Avgi cut through their chainmail and flung their upper bodies away. Blood spatter stopped at her Anima and flowed down.

For his part, Aidan coolly chopped and blasted through those in his way. He kept himself to her blindspots and intercepted any and all attacks. His side-blade was coated not with Animus, but superheated plasma. On a closer look, the halo around his blade didn’t quite touch the metal.

The agitated ambient Chaos suddenly gathered together into three flows and then rushed into separate directions. Two went into a couple of oak trees, while the last struck a nearby elm. To her surprise, the trees started to uproot themselves.

This was the moment the Tiathans had been waiting for. As one, they flowed out of the way, and finally, the Sorcerer was revealed.

Or rather, the wooden Colossus that had just finished forming around him from the broken remnants of the elm. He stared at her with a manic grin before the wood twisted and formed a helm, leaving only a small slit for eye holes.

A huge club formed as the Colossus held out an arm, and she felt it would have roared, but aside from the thudding of its footsteps, it was silent.

“What pale imitations.” Aidan clicked his tongue. “I’ll take care of those, you handle the big one.”

He didn’t wait for Yuriko’s grunt of agreement before he condensed all of his plasma balls then dashed towards an animated tree. As for the other one, a bolt of scintillating purple smashed into its centre and all at once, fire licked up the bark.

A second bolt came within a second, and the impact spread the fire up to the leaves. A high pitched keening made Yuriko’s ears hurt and the oak tree rushed towards her. The sunshards did little more than poke a couple of holes into the bark and spread the fire. And it wasn’t until she smashed it with Fri’Avgi that it fell in pieces.

Whoosh!

Only the tingling of her second dance warned her. She jumped into a roll, dropping Fri’Avgi in the process. She was back on her feet at the end of the roll and saw Rhain’s greatclub sunk into the dirt. Stones and pebbles bounced off her Anima from the impact zone.

Wham!

The Colossus dug its heels in and twisted its torso to drag the club into a swing. Dirt and rocks flew from the ground, pinging off her shell as she leapt back with arms crossed. With her mind, she called for Fri’Avgi, and through the tether in her core, summoned the artefact back into her grasp.

The greatclub rose to the heavens, paused for a moment, then swung back down. This time, Yuriko didn’t dodge.

She swung Fri’Avgi upwards, digging her heels in the dirt, and felt her sandals sink an inch into the loam before her Anima stabilized her footing. Their weapons smashed with thunderous force and she found herself with her feet sunk nearly ten inches into the ground. Her ears rang and her arms shook with the reverberation that she instinctively channelled out of her body into her Anima. The flames undulated and lashed at the ground, transferring the kinetic force and raising a cloud of dust in the process.

Rhain’s Colossus staggered back a single step, grabbed the handle of the tree trunk club with both limbs. The club and the Colossus’ hands fused into one single piece, then he smashed down like a bolt of lightning, an Animus glow focused on tip.

Gritting her teeth, she barely had enough time to brace herself and hold the greatsword across her body. The impact sunk her down another couple of inches and she could barely hold on to Fri’Avgi.

The Colossus’ faceplate was expressionless, but the light of Rhain’s eyes were visible within the slit, glowing green. She couldn’t see the rest of his face, but she imagined it twisting with glee.

The club bounced off her defence and raised high. The Colossus went on tiptoes, bringing the weapon to a greater height, and with barely a pause, smashed down.

Yuriko gritted her teeth as Animus threads formed into a series of runescript words.

Adamant.

The nearly unusable technique she learned from the Obsidian Shard back in Kogasi. With Fri’Avgi’s help, she formed the words and imprinted them along her arms and the side of the blade. She barely made it in time.

Tink.

A dingy sound, as if the club had done nothing but touch her weapon. All of the kinetic energy was sucked into the runescript words and nothing affected Yuriko. With a savage grin, the sunshards she’d been trying to sneak past Rhain’s guard threaded through the tiny opening on the faceplate and straight into the Sorcerer’s eyes.

He didn’t even have time to scream. Or whimper. The Colossus didn’t move. In fact, it turned back into a tree, one that had been uprooted, but was too broad to fall over. Yuriko slipped out from under the club.

The ambient Chaos had silenced, and there was nothing but calm. For the moment.

Then, the Tiathans screamed. And ran away.