A domain boosted a standard light elemental to a potent combat element. Tristan had somehow failed to realize what that would do to earth. Every movement was weighed down. The earth elementals healed at ludicrous speeds, if a blow was not lethal, the creature would take bisection like a simple trip. The difference might also be due to the five domain elementals and fifteen earth elementals.

“The highest one is tier three,” Siren yelled. He had to dispel his cohesion based armor. Stone seemed impervious to the weight increase, leaving Grant and Cole unaffected and Siren and Jenna partially affected.

One of the brain elementals exploded in a shower of stone as Herod blasted it with his hand cannon. The weight lessened by a fifth. Tristan grabbed the anima elemental by the arm and threw it into a wall. It smashed a mummy to powder. He flinched back, not wanting to breathe in dead human, giving the elemental time to return to its feet.

Tristan grinned at the elemental. It was probably Tristan's most comfortable match up. Earth was a blunt element, it lacked many of the tricks that propped up the others. Metal was simply a better blunt element, also he had spent most of his teenage years in a mine. A pick construct formed around the lamppost’s shaft. Then Tristan went mining.

He kicked the elemental down and smashed it with the pick axe, taking advantage of the enhanced domain weight to add power to his blow. Its abdominal wall cracked like dry soil, revealing the dull brown glow of the organ sack. He wound up to deliver the final blow, but the skin knit itself back together between strikes. Glancing back he saw Herod still cranking up his hand cannon, did no one else have ranged weapons?

“Someone kill the brains on the roof!” Tristan yelled. He had ranged options, unfortunately they were indiscriminate and might sink the can they were rolling along in.

Dane had the answer. He was too short to reach the ceiling, even with his pole axe. The weight made it difficult to jump, but the man had the answer. He used his force to stop his weight from impacting the world around him and ran up an earth elemental’s arm and onto its head. That gave him enough reach.

Tristan smashed the elemental once more before it could rise. It healed noticeably slower, but still way too fast. Tristan was not patient enough to wait. He shoved his empty hand into the gap. The sharp claws on the end of his gauntlet tore through the organ sack. It felt like tearing apart coarse sand, and it gave him an idea. Could he harvest brains and guts as well? Would they also turn into essence reservoirs?

Now was not the time to try. Before the body could dissolve, Tristan grabbed a chunk of stone and threw it at the brain elementals. Jell was a great impact absorber. The rock hit accurately but only succeeded in jiggling the elemental. Maybe that was the stimuli it needed or maybe it was allowed to absorb enough essence, but the elemental started pulsing earth essence through its body.

Tristan had seen this happen before, but no one had ever let it finish. One other elemental had fallen to Kale shoving a small star into its guts, but all others were in various stages of disrepair. Tristan ran up behind one that was targeting Jenna and grabbed it under its arms. It was heavy but Tristan was still able to lift it.

“What?” Jenna asked.

Tristan only nodded at the ceiling. He did not wait to see if she received the message, Jenna was not a bad person, but he had higher priorities. Reaching Luke he hefted the squirming tier one elemental above their heads. A bag of rocks is heavy, a bag of rocks that squirms is almost impossible. Fortunately, he didn’t have to wait long.

The weight in his hands rapidly decreased, it was not enough to lift it into the air, but it was concerning. Tristan had only seen this effect one other time and that was his gravity fire blast. This only seemed to affect stone, as Tristan himself was not any lighter.

Rubble floated into the air like it was buoyant. Luke was oblivious, a look of concentration plastered across his face. The rubble reached the roof, several others had taken cover in various ways, Merrick had created an ice shield. Those with earth kerns used the lightened armor to kill a few anima elementals, before thickening the earthen plates.

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Tristan braced himself under the thrashing elemental. Then it got heavy. Tristan was capable of lifting around fifteen hundred pounds over his head. The increase in weight nearly drove him to his knees. A follow up of pebble sized bullets slammed down into the room.

Tristan gritted his teeth and flooded the joints in his armor with metal. The constructs bent, but the extra brace stopped him from dropping an elemental on Luke. He quickly looked around for any more surprises.

The elementals were just as injured by the projectiles as the warriors were. Kerri had a rock stuck in his thigh, Kale had blood running down the side of his head, and the elite with the pole axe had died sheltering Herod with his body. Tristan regretted not taking the time to learn his name.

Pole axe man’s body started smoking, the blood baked to the skin. Before the newborn elemental could emerge Siren skewered the heart. The action looked like it hurt him, but it was something that needed to be done.

The injured elementals quickly healed. Stony sinew and muscle fiber grew like vines to rebuild a whole being. Tristan felt the one he was holding regain its vigor.

“No you don’t,” Tristan growled.

He was about to throw it over and beat it with his pick axe when Luke stopped him, “Hold on.”

Tristan stopped, he trusted Luke, but he couldn’t hold the elemental up forever, “What do you need?”

“The next room is full of air elementals, they are putting out carbon dioxide faster than I can clean it up,” Luke donned the erosion gauntlet and scooped out most of the elemental's chest cavity.

He was careful to avoid the organs, keeping it alive. The claws of the gauntlet did take most of the elemental’s focus off of fighting and placed it on healing. Luke did not allow it, a ball of smokey ice coalesced in his palm. It was so cold that Tristan felt the temperature around him drop a few degrees.

“A tier five you can control the state of your element,” Luke explained in response to Tristan’s quizzical expression, “It's harder to heat things up than cool them down, but I don’t know why.”

He shoved the sphere inside and then let the stone heal around it. After a brief inspection, Luke pointed into the next room, “Toss it in.”

Tristan obliged, heaving the elemental. Parts chipped off it as it bounced out of the light and into the darkness. Flexing his joints to finish breaking the metal, Tristan turned to the earthen battle. It was almost over. The anima elementals were gone, only three brain elementals were left. The threat had grown, as all of them were starting to pulse again.

Siren hooked both hands together and crouched. Kale used his interlaced fingers as a step. He jumped and Siren hurled him upwards. The compounded strength of tier fours made for an impressive amount of air time.

Kale sailed upwards, a compressed flame construct trailing light in his fist like a comet. He reached the apex of his flight and shoved the burning essence into the gathering of elementals. There was a pause as he fell, then the explosion splattered slime across the room and Kale was hurled at the floor.

Siren caught him before he could hit a desk. The Mythical beast leather was damaged at the seams but had held up admirably. Evidently mythical beast string was not used.

Kale wiped jelly off of himself as he regained his feet, “That was disgusting.”

“We need to rest,” Merrick said glancing uncertainly at the next room.

“We are at the mercy of the Lord of the Underworld right now, we can’t rest,” Kerri said.

“We are exhausting ourselves,” Merrick countered, “We can fight through a few more rooms, but we won’t be able to stand our ground when the real fight starts.”

Tristan frowned, Merrick was tired? Many of Siren's elites shared similar glances. This was hard, yes, but none of them were getting exhausted. It was dangerous work, but they were punching down tiers for the most part.

However, Herod, Kerri, Cole, and Merrick were showing signs of tiring. Tristan could only shake his head. Was the only difference between an elite and a common man the challenges they had acclimatized to? The evidence suggested as much.

“Tough,” Luke said, “I just threw a bomb into the next room.”

Everyone turned to Luke as he gave his most charming smile and threw a lightning bolt into the next room. There was a pause before an explosion rocked the structure. It counteracted the force that was spinning the fortress for a moment. The pause threw them into a wall, Tristan hit a desk and caught Luke before he could go flying.

There was a flash of light and stone shrapnel rattled off everyone’s armor. The fortress resumed its spinning and things went back to normal. Tristan was not sure how much damage had been done, as there was no light, but it was good enough.

“You have my attention. Come to me, I will pass judgment upon you,” The Lord of the Underworld said with a distinct tone of displeasure in his voice.

Kerri shrugged, “At least we won’t be exhausted.”