The increased vigor of the eldritch demons and goblins as they tore at each other to be the first to reach Tiria was the only reason that she hadn't been overwhelmed yet, but she was under no illusion that she'd make it the last fifteen minutes.

"Poe," Tiria called out as she ran one claw through the web binding holding Chum to her back. A demon dove at her and Tiria leapt in the air, using the monster's face as a springboard. The motion jostled Chum and she awkwardly caught him in her right arm and cinched the unconscious Nori further up on her left.

"Take Chum! Get him and the doll to safety!"

He was so light that Tiria was able to easily toss Chum into the air where thankfully Poe caught him. He had the doll in two limbs and Chum in the other four.

"I don't want to leave you!" Poe shouted. Poe had always been tenderhearted, but at that moment, a goblin she hadn't seen clawed her back, creating a line of pain.

"I don't care what you want!" Tiria did a flip, kicking the offending goblin into a tree. The movement also gave her a front row seat to the incoming tsunami of monsters. "We're out of time! Take the compass and take the doll there! It needs Gi's mirror!"

She pulled the compass out of her [Expanded Pocket] and tossed it into the air in front of Poe too. He caught it in his jaws before shouting something incoherent around it. Even though she couldn't understand his words, his eyes told her that abandoning her here would break him.

"Go! Or I die for nothing!"

A helpless scream around the stone compass cut through the howls of the monsters, but Poe did fly off. She felt guilty for forcing that on Poe, but at least, he, Chum, and their dream would be alive.

A goblin appeared on her right sprinting beside her. Before it could attack, Tiria tugged down hard on its arm and the creature smacked into the roots of a tree before it was trampled by its fellows.

Another claw found her thigh and Tiria pushed her sprinting faster to stay just ahead of the wave. She glanced down at Nori still unconscious in her arms and she wondered if leaving her would buy her some time.

WE PROTECT THE PEAK!

The memory of the twins came so suddenly that she almost staggered. The two of them fought against a far superior opponent and refused to budge an inch. They refused to abandon Gi even if the action was fruitless.

Shame spread through her entire being. She'd been so quick to think of abandoning someone who had taken her in and fought with her for months just to protect her own pathetic life. No, she'd keep Nori alive as long as she could.

Another claw ripped into her shoulder. The snag yanked her back and she was engulfed in a swarm of bodies and claws. Tiria was still running, almost propelled forward by the rolling tide of enemies, but claws ripped into her body. One of the bastards' teeth bit off half her ear.

Activating [Lord Commander] again, she used the brief opening before her summons were consumed to sprint out just ahead of the wave. She was screaming from pain or in defiance she wasn't sure, but she wasn't the only one.

"What the fuck?!" Nori's eyes rolled wildly about in her head as she jostled in Tiria's arms. Her hands went to a handful of wounds that had appeared across her body during their brief time in the press of bodies.

It was only a second for her to come to her senses, but Tiria could see her eyes widen when they fell upon the horde.

"I'm sorry," Tiria yelled over the howls. She activated a watery mace and tossed it back into their enemies hoping to buy even just another second before they were overtaken. "We're not going to make it out."

"The fuck if I'm dying before I have a chance to burn this whole forest to the ground." She gritted her teeth and then screamed out in pain. "Fuck. I can't use my Skills."

At that moment, the wave overtook them again. A quick turn barely saved Tiria's eye from being gouged out. Nori fought like one of the possessed monsters herself, but it didn't stop either of them from being cut up by the grinder in that moment they were inside.

Another [Lord Commander] bought them just enough time to push back ahead of the wave.

Blood soaked her entire robe and it ran down from the open wound above her eyes and drizzled into her mouth. The metallic taste was not welcome. She spat.

"We can't go inside again," Nori said, looking equally ravaged.

"I don't think we have a choice!"

Nori growled. "If I'm going to die, I'll die on my feet."

Nori rotated in her grip and Tiria let go, thinking that the goblin Progenitor wanted to run beside her. Instead, she climbed up her body, each new grip that latched against an open wound sent a wave of pain through her. Eventually, Nori crouched on Tiria's shoulder, practically sitting on top of her head as she faced backwards.

"Steady my legs."

Tiria grabbed both of Nori's ankles at the same time she adjusted her own run to account for how awkward it was to have someone on her shoulders. If it wasn't for the stats she'd gained fighting against the demons with Nori, she never could have done managed to keep her in place and remain running.

But she did. She leaned forward just a little so Nori was more standing on her back than shoulders and locked her core as she sprinted through the forest.

Maybe they could-

Tiria stumbled as soon as Nori started fighting and the wave of monsters engulfed them. Inside the horde, Nori fought like the monster she was, but the claws of demons and goblins tried to snatch her off Tiria's shoulders. Roaring, Tiria cast [Lord Commander] again and they broke out.

"I have maybe... One more of those before I won't have enough of Aether."

"Then don't trip this time, dumbass."

Blood pouring down her body, Tiria sprinted onwards. Between the wounds and the fact that she'd been sprinting as fast as she could go for the past ten minutes, her breath was already coming in ragged gasps.

The sound of her steps and her own blood pounded in her ears, drowning out the sounds of the horde that hounded their steps. If it wasn't for the occasional claw tearing a a new ditch into her flesh, she might have not noticed them at all so intense was her focus.

With Tiria mostly stabilized, Nori fought like a god. She wasn't able to move her feet, but Nori's [Fighting Style] wasn't some common Skill that had been realized. For her, that was the focal point of her entire life. As many of them as there were, only so many of them could approach at once.

Nori's feet barely moved, but even in her focused state it was hard not to see the bodies being tossed left and right before they were trampled.

As five minutes passed like that, Tiria started to hope. There was no way that they could defeat them all, but could they actually escape?

That hope lasted another five minutes, helping to steel Tiria's resolve, but a sudden shifting of weight brought her attention back to Nori. She'd fallen across her back, one arm hooked around Tiria's neck to hold on.

The horde engulfed them again.

Grabbing hands and snatching claws threatened to yank Nori off her back. More slashes crisscrossed the ones that were already there, sending even more blood cascading down her back.

The wounds and the sprinting were starting to strain even Tiria's enhanced Vitality. Realizing that Nori had been healed excessively by Chum, she must be even closer to the verge of death if she wasn't already.

[Lord Commander] gave them just enough space to break back out of the front of monster tsunami, but Tiria's strength was starting to flag and Nori barely moved on her back.

The fact that she was mumbling something under breath was the only indicator that she was still alive. The mauling after she'd fallen had used up her second wind. If there was any way for them to get out now, it would be up to Tiria.

Tiria - who's own body was shredded. Who's lungs labored to take in breath. Who's Aether had only recovered enough during their run for one more [Lord Commander].

She was out of options and she still had what she assumed was five more minutes of sprinting to break out of this forest.

She mentally flicked through her Skills, but the only one that really stood out was [Charge] but it was an E grade Skill. It was inefficient and required her to target an enemy to activate. All of her enemies were behind her.

She might could alter it, but that would require more Aether and even if she succeeded, it might net her the same distance as one or two [Lord Commander] uses?

With her low Aether, the only thing she could truly count on was her Domain [Waterborne Armory] but she could never use that to fight them off. It always required her to throw the constructs for it to do any damage.

But... She wasn't trying to fight was she?

Taken by a sudden inspiration, she dumped Aether into her Domain and a long chain separated by chunks of barbed rods appeared in her hand. It's use wasn't that different from her normal method so the only extra Aether she needed to spend was to keep it straight before she tossed it out behind her.

It worked perfectly.

The barbed rods caught on the eldritch flesh and then the chains wrapped around the monsters chasing her. The damage they felt was negligible, but suddenly being lashed to the monster next to you in a chaotic horde?

A whole line of the monsters stumbled and fell before they were trampled. The monster to the side and above jumped and dodged so it wasn't catastrophic to the horde, but it did buy her time - cheaply.

The monsters howled and the voices in Tiria's mind surged, but she easily fought them back and a smile appeared on her exhausted face.

They could make it.

It cost her and Nori both some more chunks of their own flesh, but she eventually formed a rhythm. The horde would surge and she'd toss back her barbed trip chain buying them some space for a few moments before the horde surged again.

There were so many of them in the forest that it felt like she was trying to fight the very ocean. Still, step by step she was succeeding. All of her limbs felt loose from exhaustion, but she flung them forward one step at a time.

Minute by minute, they grew closer to the edge. The whispers that had turned violent attenuated to a dull static. The sunlight seemed to push back the darkness just a little bit further.

She went to summon another chain and... her Aether was gone.

Panicking, she scraped the remnants from her very soul and managed to produce a chain about half the size as normal. Tossing it backward, it helped some, but had nowhere near the impact of the full length.

Was this it? She could practically taste the salt in the air from the ocean just beyond the village, but she didn't have anything left to give. Her body was torn and shredded. Blood still poured freely through her fur. Her Aether tried to regenerate, but with the state of her body, it was sluggish and slow.

Maybe it wouldn't be so bad. She'd succeeded - well, half of her goal. It had seemed impossible so many months ago. Her eyes felt weighed down by the weight of exhaustion.

Maybe it wouldn't be so bad to finally rest...

"FOR THE UNDERBRIDGE!"

The booming voice snapped her eyes back open just as the horde engulfed her again. Poe had returned and he... was huge. Each of his legs were the size of a tree themselves and he pushed back the branches to look down on them.

That brief moment was all she got before the blender of claws and teeth took her, but now she had a goal and a small seed of hope. Just as she scraped her soul for the remnants of Aether so to did she scrape her body for the last bits of stamina.

Even as numb as she felt, her muscles screamed in protest as she pumped her legs faster and faster, demanding a little more than she could have given. Something blocked out the light and ripped off the top half of the horde.

Two giant insect legs stabbed down like giant pillars on either side of her, cutting off the horde on the left and right.

"GO!" Poe screamed again and she could hear the pain in his voice as the horde now attacked him. She wanted to help him, but she had run herself so dry that all she could do was put her hope in him. She ran and she ran and-

Sunlight hit her face as she broke through the trees. She tried to slow down, but she'd been running so long. Her body didn't even know what it felt like to be still.

She fell.

Again, the parallels between her and Gi were not lost on her, but the difference was that Gi had been dead when he fell from the sky. Tiria wasn't and she had an unshakeable faith that Poe would save her.

She closed her eyes. Thank you Danna for sending him to me.

You've developed a Unique Soul!

You've gained: Soul of Conviction

Aspect: Water