Jacob backpedalled up the slope and crouched behind a shelf of rock. His heart thrummed. He tried not to panic but it wasn't working.

The rogue mage stopped. His fingers flexed as if he were processing something. Magic rippled out from him. A cone of light lanced forward and gored one of the crabs. The others screeched and scattered. The largest crab flailed its arms at the man and golden light appeared above the crystals on its shell. A fireball shot out.

The rogue mage flipped his hand up. A blue wall that looked similar to the ward Deputy Millicent had thrown against the Reaper opened up in front of him and absorbed the fireball. The man deftly flicked his wrist and another cone of light lanced at the crab. It smacked the crab in the shell, cracking it and sending it tumbling across the crystal ground.

The rogue mage grinned.

Jacob's blood chilled. He was trembling and he couldn't stop himself. He couldn't move. He couldn't look away. If the man looked up at him now he'd see him and then he'd-

The rogue mage straightened and sauntered over to the big crab. The rest had all disappeared except for the other one he'd attacked. The big crabbed chittered weakly. Light glowed above it, but the man punted it into the obelisk. He laughed, like a child kicking a soccer ball. The big crab smacked into the obelisk and fell still. Silver liquid trickled out of it.

"Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. You guys should really just give up. Makes it easier on me. Makes it easier on you."

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The rogue mage routed two more crabs from their hiding spots around the valley, dispatched them and kicked their corpses over to the obelisk. He raised his hand, palm splayed, and a thrum of magic echoed out, rippling past Jacob and off into the crystals around them. The man held it for a long moment, then dropped his hand and squatted down and rocked back on his haunches, waiting.

"C'mon, first come, first serve. Nice and quick now. We don't have all day."

To Jacob's surprise, a dog appeared at one of the mouths to the valley. It looked around, saw the man, then padded forward warily. As it drew nearer Jacob saw it looked more like a wolf than a dog. But even then its body was too sleek and long and... jagged, to be a wolf. Its fur was spiky and white. Blue and cloud-grey rings rippled along it when it walked. It growled low in its throat, a rumbling noise like a distant thunderstorm, and bared its sabre-tooth fangs.

"Easy, there raijū." The man said, backing up. "It's all yours."

The raijū padded towards the obelisk and the carcasses of the crabs around it. It lowered its head and sniffed the first crab, then bit viciously into it. Silver fluid leaked out of the crab's body and flowed into the raijū.

After the first two crabs the raijū grew, when it finished the third its white fur turned an electric blue and its eyes glowed. When it finished off the fourth ripples of blue lightning encased its flank and magic crackled out from it. Even across the valley, Jacob's hairs stood on end. The raijū reared its head back and let out a howl like a great booming thunderclap.

Jacob clapped his hands to his ears.

And then the air around the raijū shone. The crystals behind it rippled with rainbows of light. The air warped and swirled in on itself. The raijū thrashed. It dragged the air around it with every movement. And then it had torn a hole through the world and fell through. Jacob saw a flash of concrete and garbage littering a sidewalk.

The hole knit closed, leaving Jacob alone with the rogue mage.