Natalie started spewing fire and heat everywhere, and in response, the hydra grew over 20 heads and burst into flames all at once. The heads started melting and more heads grew to replace them. These too burned to a crisp, until by the fourth reincarnation, the former three headed creature was now a mass of hundreds of flaming heads and necks, growing out of the ground like stalks of wheat.

Similar to Natalie, the hydra had embraced fire. Flames permeated almost all of its cells, like its spiritual body was heat itself.

'She can't beat that.' Finn gritted his teeth and pulled on his right goat horn. Caroline had summoned a black energy ball around them, which was transparent from the inside.

'Believe in your friend,' she said. 'Artificial beings like that should not exist.'

Before Finn could ask for explanations, the two flaming titans clashed. Countless burning maws tried to bite into Natalie, and when she cut them to pieces, even more rose up to the challenge.

Tremendous necks popped out of the ground, like burning columns, and chased after the flaming swordswoman like they hadn't eaten in months.

'It stopped shooting flames and meteors, but… this is too much.'

The field of necks and humongous burning jaws grew quickly, from a patch no more numerous than the trees inside a park to a forest full of razor sharp teeth that was quickly spreading past Natalie, towards Caroline and Finn.

Caroline's eyes went wide and her lips trembled.

"It has fully absorbed father's power."

"What's all this crap about fathers? Goddamn it, I'm starting to sound like Michael."

"Mr. Finn, if you truly are hiding your power…"

The forest of flaming hydra necks was quickly approaching. Explosions and the wail of beasts could be heard from where Natalie was waging battle, but that was so far away in the middle of the town-sized cave, the two could no longer see her.

"Mr. Finn, I can only blast ten heads at a time. I need 30 seconds to create another crystal, can you stall them?"

Weirdly, the man had his head down; he was holding his right goat horn as sweat poured down his forehead.

'I misjudged you.' Caroline frowned, pulled herself and Finn out of the crystal ball, and then hurled it at the incoming flaming necks.

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12 of them blew up, only for 16 more to grow in their place mere moments later.

'Good luck,' Caroline transmitted as she prepared to flee.

'Wait, why did you unsummon the ball? I need 43 more seconds.'

'It would have broken anyway. Are you back to your senses? We need to run.'

'Stall them.'

‘Why?’

Caroline gave Finn a second look. The boy had not moved an inch for some time now. He was huddled like a ball, his eyes closed and his hand holding onto the right horn on his head.

'Was I wrong?' thought Caroline. 'Are you summoning a spell? I was convinced you panicked like an infant, crying for his mother to feed him milk.'

'...I'm not a baby! I'm summoning something, just… Just buy me some time.'

The right goat horn on his head was starting to glow. Seeing this, Caroline grabbed and pulled him out of the way of an incoming maw.

Dozens of other heads followed, then hundreds, then almost a thousand. Caroline could barely keep up with their speed, and she was running out of physical space to escape to.

"Why do you protect the hero's spawn, Caroline!?"

"Father?..."

The blue girl hesitated for just a moment, but it was enough for a flaming maw to swallow Finn whole.

"Finally!" the creature rejoiced. "The second hero is no mo…"

In the middle of the flaming forest of necks, Natalie was destroying hundreds at a time. However, for every skull or neck she cut down, another one soon took its place.

The woman knew this was a battle of attrition. Whoever would run out of energy first would be the loser.

Unfortunately, the hydra fed on the heat released by the magma it was blocking off with its body. It also fed on Natalie’s flames, far more efficiently than she did in reverse.

'Am I doomed to fail again?'

'Hey Natalie, how do we beat this thing?'

'Not now Finn, I…'

The woman's eyes turned wide. Finn had appeared to her side, one horn down and with a dark red dagger in his right arm.

'Where did you come from? Why didn't I feel you coming?'

Finn shrugged while over a dozen giant, flaming heads turned to swallow his body. Suddenly, his right arm flickered and all 12 hydra heads splattered like oversized bowls of soup.

Natalie opened her mouth to say something, but Finn disappeared, and at the same time hundreds of hydra heads and throats began imploding all around her.

Halfway across the cave, Caroline was struggling to escape while summoning another crystal. The monstrous flaming heads blocked all of her exits, and several of them were racing to swallow her whole.

"Father, help!" she closed her eyes and shouted.

Suddenly, flaming, lizard blood splattered all over her body. She opened her eyes to see all the hydra necks around her destroyed for a distance of roughly 400 feet reaching all the way to where Natalie was fighting.

“Yes, I am your father.” She heard Finn chuckle. “Sorry it took so long. It's been almost a year since I last unsummoned one of them.”