Due to being almost empty of mana, Dan was not entirely full of confidence. However, seeing the relief and excitement mingling on Hyun Soon’s face, he could hardly back down and convince him to run. As Hyun looked past Dan towards the man who used to be Po Kahn, his face took on a new emotion. Rage.

They might as well at least try.

“Okay, Hyun. We owe this thing a beating for Xiaomei’s sake, right?” Dan’s question received only a nod in response, Hyun’s jaw so tightly clenched he could not answer out loud. Dan stood behind his more solidly built friend. Steel Fever seemed fully healed now as it quietly analysed the enemies before it. It stepped forward slowly, Dan and Hyun both taking a few steps back.

Dan took stock of the energy within. While his own stock was drained, he had collected enough from his allies to feel something akin to bloated. He had taken a heavy amount from Po Daiyu and Xiaomei, both of which he had used more efficiently than he would have thought possible. Hyun Soon had just filled him with an ample amount of his warm, forgefire mana, still filling into the spaces within Dan’s mana channels. Shade’s mana was more flitting and much harder to hold on to than the energy he had received from Hyun and the others. Still, he felt he had at least one more jump left.

Then a hand touched Dan’s back. The world exploded into colour and there was a moment of stunned wonder before Dan sequestered Yurie’s mana and regained focus. Another potential weapon or defence, which Dan took happily. In a quiet and trembling voice, Yurie asked “What should I do?”

Dan’s heart trembled with pity and anger. Yurie didn’t deserve any of this. Whatever guiding light had brought her to Dan had, in essence, led her here. “Go with Shade.” Right on cue, the majaal appeared. As though stepping from behind an invisible wall, Shade casually strolled into existence. “The church in Allusia. Xiaomei is there with Po Daiyu. It’s either safe, or they need you.”

Shade nodded. “I can do that.” Then he held out his elbow, as though he and Yurie were to hook arms and walk off into the night. “I imagine you did not expect this when you pretended to be a guard that day. Are you ready?”

“Questioning whether I should have ever got on that boat,” Yurie replied solemnly, before a large smile filled her now unscarred face, “nah, just kidding. I’d do it all again in the blink of a bird’s eye.” Then she actually did hook her arm with Shade, looking altogether far too jaunty for the loathsome surroundings. “Don’t die, alright? Good.”

Then they vanished. Dan was sure he heard a yelp as they did but he was happy to pretend it was just Oblax landing. While they spoke, their enemies had prepared, too.

Fa Lian took up a position to the other side of Hyun Soon. “Dan. I can’t see Oblax’s attacks. You can?” During the small lull in combat, the walls of skeletons had risen in a uniform oval. Glancing above, Dan was sure that whoever was on the podium was the cause of that little quirk. Now the place really did look like the arena Dan and the others had met the Ashes what felt like a lifetime ago. Dan had covered the small colosseum in his mana.

“I can. I don’t have enough energy to heal, though.”

“Hmph.” Fa Lian’s snort was so draconic, Dan actually looked to see if smoke had come from her nose. Instead she held out her hand behind Hyun’s back. Dan took it, even though his channels almost begged him not to put them under more stress. He would need everything he could handle and Fa Lian had more than enough to spare. As though the energy was happy to find Dan already full, he felt Fa Lian’s mana cover each of the other aspects, a dragon coiling onto its hoard.

The final piece to a puzzle Dan did not know he was solving, Fa Lian’s mana dominated the other pools of energy within himself and enhanced them. His mana armour began to take on a new shape and colour. Instead of a simple, sleek set of dark plates, ethereal scales took their place. Dan took hold of the mana now, understanding what it could do, and directed it towards the remnants of Calliope’s energy.

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Fa Lian’s mana was not destruction, it was power. More power than can be handled without a buffer. Pure, it destroys mana and matter alike, but bound to the other energy within Ah Dan it began to sing. His draconic breastplate formed, weightless but imposing. At his fingertips, Calliope’s phantom lion claws met with Ryong Aang’s essence and grew, extending to truly dangerous lengths. Every spot of armour which could be made more intimidating grew spikes or gained design intricacies.

It was far more impressive looking than Dan could have ever expected and he could feel the gaze of his friends on him at that moment. “What?” He asked, glad that his armour had created a helmet to hide his blush.

“Nothing.” Hyun Soon and Fa Lian said together, smiles evident in their single word. Fa Lian whispered, knowing Dan would hear it, “how touching,” and the blush in Dan’s face got even fiercer.

It relaxed him. The situation was dire and showed no signs of getting less so. There was a lot still to work out but stood next to his two friends, Dan felt no worries. “Ready?” He asked.

“Ready.” Fa Lian and Hyun Soon did not wait for any more signal. It wasn’t needed. Like three arrows fired at once, they shot forward. Their enemies were ready and responded accordingly. Steel Fever jumped forward first, fist reaching back for another explosive punch. Before the blow could land, Fa Lian stamped the floor and shot off to one side, colliding with the bone wall and launching herself back. Hyun Soon simply walked through the blast, his armour cracking in places but reforming as he poured his will and strength into the defence.

Dan’s attention could not rest with them, however. He had to focus on brother Oblax. Though it pained him to do it, Dan collected his mana more closely, losing his ability to track the other fight and the man on the podium above. As a trade, he could see Oblax Claré with startling clarity. There was something different about him, the way he held himself and even the way he walked. Now that Dan thought about it, his jump from the podium high above was also unexpected.

Oblax had been staring into space, looking at the middle distance between Dan and himself but his head suddenly snapped up and his eyes met Dan’s. With a snapping sound, Dan saw Oblax’s leg click into place, knee dislocated from the fall. A high pitched giggle started coming from him. “It doesn’t hurt.” Dan could hear him saying over and over.

Dan didn’t have time to figure out what was going wrong with Oblax. If he was distracted, all the better. Aiming to finish the battle quickly, Dan aimed his punch for Oblax’s throat. It was with a kind of horrified confusion that Dan felt the fist connect. He felt the crunch of bone, a terrible squashing felt through the mana around his hand. Oblax had not tried to dodge or lessen the blow at all. Dan watched in stunned anticipation. Oblax landed heavily, thrown far by the solid punch.

With a horrible pit in his stomach, Dan was certain he had just killed the man. The pit only got deeper and heavier to hold as he began to flail and gurgle. His windpipe was completely crushed and there was no breath going to his lungs. Dan wasn’t sure what do to and looked around for Fa Lian or Hyun Soon, anyone to tell him whether he should be happy or worried.

Before he could make a foolish mistake, the gurgles changed. The flailing stopped and broken, choking laughter filled the air. Dan realised he hadn’t been in pain before, he had been giggling to himself. “Doesn’t hurt!” Was all the man had to say, rising from the ground and carelessly swiping his hands twice, as though clearing dust from his face.

Two gigantic gouge marks appeared in the air. There was only one moment of warning, a flash when the space that was about to be destroyed signalled danger. Dan avoided it but only narrowly. It was no surprise that these attacks had pushed Fa Lian back, but there was something frantic or careless about them now. Armour or no, careless or not, he was sure that those attacks would leave a lasting mark.

Dan could hear chanting from above as Oblax regained his voice and taunted. “You can’t hurt me, fool. The master’s whip controls pain and has removed me from the cycle.” Then, all intelligible speech disappeared and Dan was forced to endure a barrage of spatial tears, their intensity increasing with each frustration inducing dodge.

Dan, for his part, also threw some ranged attacks. For what they were worth, Dan was fairly sure that in another circumstance, his opponent would have been completely defeated, if not seriously injured, by the slashing blades of energy. Most enemies would block the attack, dodge it or lessen the damage in some way. Oblax was slowly walking forward, cackling with every step and wantonly throwing attacks as he did.

The chanting from above continued all the while. Dan’s concentrated mana showed him more clearly what was happening there. A fine mist of healing energy seemed to trail around Oblax. When Dan hit him, this mist lessened somewhat, but would return within a stanza of the chant above. A river of healing mana was flowing into Oblax, muting his sense of pain and allowing his unstoppable approach.

A few of Dan’s attacks were aimed skyward, but a barrier of energy protected the person above from harm. Oblax had called him master, so someone high up in the church? Dan had no tutelage in the religious arts, so he could only guess. He supposed it didn’t matter, too much.

Dan had already come up with a way to cancel the healing.

He just hoped it worked.