Ruined fey flesh now hung like a torn second-hand coat on the creatures’ new forms. The ones within the berm were still taking damage from the iron, but it was immediately apparent that it was negligible to their newly evolved forms. Brokenridge’s laughter choked off into a roar of disgust, and he reared back, releasing a jet of flames that bathed their surroundings until the tops of the berm on all sides were glowing, leaving the fastest-moving evolved fey as charred husks.

Tilly’s hand was still explosively releasing iron filings. He shifted its output, focusing on the direction he had last seen the fey king. The wild grinding sound continued to drive forward even as Tilly absolutely choked the area before him with a mountain of iron filings. Brokenridge leaped into the air, attempting to take the battle to the enemy beyond their temporary protection. Unfortunately, as soon as his body cleared the berm, several dragon glass spears zipped through the air and lodged deeply in the dragon as he roared out in pain.

More of the deadly spears followed, but he activated that same silvery dodge Ability Tilly had seen at the Perfected Golem Faction and moved through the rest of the projectiles with supernatural grace. Tilly attempted to continue to lock down Oberon, while Brokenridge managed to ascend high enough to remove himself from further risk of injury.

Then, as suddenly as it started, the withdrawal from the ring finished. Almost immediately after, the blender sound from beyond the mountain of iron filings before him stopped. The field of battle was briefly plunged into an uneasy quiet, and Tilly shot another look up into the air to see Brokenridge wheeling around to charge a breath attack.

Tilly's eyes dropped, scanning his surroundings and finding no enemies in his immediate vicinity; only his makeshift iron defense and a dozen or so burned husks. Aside from the view directly above him, he had effectively cut off his line of sight from the rest of the enemy with his surprise attack and Hiro’s words came back to him from what felt like a lifetime ago.

‘Never lose sight of the enemy.’

Tilly rushed to the top of the berm. Despite failing in his initial plan to lock down the king before releasing the iron, he hadn’t come away from the initial exchange too badly. He could feel two levels now banked in his soul, stats ready to be distributed.

As he leaped up the iron barricade, he dropped half of his free points into Endurance and the other five points all went to Intelligence. He was going to need as much help as possible to live through the rest of his plan. Even with that boost, his Intelligence score of thirty-three didn’t do much to boost his confidence.

Tilly topped the berm and found the hundreds of remaining Corrupted fey around him had transformed into tentacled horrors reminiscent of the final forms of Marcellus the elder and younger. One of Brokenridge’s hypercharged bars of plasma carved through the group of enemies nearest to him, but Tilly ignored them, swinging his head around wildly to locate-

Crack

Tilly coughed, somehow finding himself back at the epicenter of his explosive distribution of iron filings. His chest felt like it had been caved in, daggers of pain lancing through his left lung as he coughed again, this time bringing up blood. He looked down to see a fist-sized indentation over the ribs protecting his heart and his eyes flicked up to his HUD:

Health: 66%

Mana: 68%

“You are astonishingly resilient! Perhaps I should be calling you ‘cockroach’?” Oberron said, appearing in Tilly’s vision as he leaned over to look down at him. He hadn’t even seen the guy move, and his cool expression emphasized to Tilly just how casually he had taken almost a third of Tilly's Health.

If they were going to have a chance, he had to find a way to lock the fey down and his previous idea of a surprise grapple seemed stupid in light of the king's insane speed. On top of that, Oberon seemed to be surrounded by an orb of swiftly moving mana that reminded Tilly of a breeze, keeping away any stray iron dust that might have threatened him. Yet even with the wind protection and whatever other magical contingencies the king had prepared for his defense, Tilly was gratified to see several cuts showing on the king’s exposed face and hands.

Attempting to take Tilly’s trick head-on hadn’t been easy for the king, and despite the light tone of his question, Tilly could see a maddening dark fury coloring the fey’s face.

“Sure *cough* ‘cockroach’ works for me,” Tilly said, groaning as he sat up from his impact site as if he hadn’t a care in the world.

If the king drew his sword, he was probably fast enough to kill Tilly before he even had a chance to activate [Resolute]. And since there was nothing Tilly could do to stop that, he simply pretended like the possibility didn’t concern him, leaning into whatever mystique he may still hold with the king.

A stat-for-stat contest would kill Tilly, even if he temporarily boosted something besides Endurance… No, he needed to change the nature of this conflict altogether… He needed to shake the king into doing something stupid.

Tilly slowly stood to his feet before the vastly superior opponent. The fey king watched him warily, fascination warring with fury across the battleground of his face in a conflict only made uniquely possible by the shattered nature of the Corrupted king’s psyche.

Seeing his opportunity, Tilly pushed his luck, stoking his curiosity. “You are wondering how I keep surviving things that should have killed anyone else at my level… if my mannerism is fatalistic, or warranted…” Tilly stated, distracting the fey while he finished standing. Fractured ribs shot knives of pain into his chest with every breath as he straightened painfully before the vastly superior opponent.

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“I must confess, I have wondered if you are perhaps a dragon who somehow took on human form. Or perhaps even one of the Eldar, hiding away in this pitiful body… But it does not matter. Whatever else you are, you are prey, and I am the Hunter,” the fey answered, curiosity slowly dying on his face before the wild onslaught of his growing blood lust. The king’s hand dropped slowly toward his pommel in an almost mocking display of intent as his eyes watched Tilly carefully, ready to react to some trap.

In the face of what should be certain death for someone like him, Tilly channeled every bit of arrogance he had witnessed from his draconic counterpart, stepping into the king's space slowly, his face screwing into a rictus of rage, “I am no one’s prey!” he thundered into the king's face, unleashing the full weight of his aura empowered by all three of his applicable Titles.

[Primal Aura], [Draconic Authority], and [Peerless Annihilation] surged up from the depths of his soul, along with a veritable tsunami of auric power. Tilly snarled as he applied his Will to channel the full tide of his aura to press down on the Corrupted fey king shoving him into the ground. The weight of ten thousand charred bodies crashed down on the fey, as the screams of countless burning Corrupted beings pressed in on him from every side.

With [Primal Aura] giving him access to and then empowering his very soul as a weapon, Tilly struck with the full weight of his pain-filled life. His experiences as a conduit for incredible destructive forces had marked him indelibly, soaking his soul in blood and ash. Then [Peerless Annihilation] had magnified all of it to an almost deific degree, lending him a weight that was far beyond anything even most of the plane’s powers were capable of.

Yet despite all of that, Oberon was ancient and cunning. He should have been able to resist the attack with the density of his soul alone, slipping out of the conflict and ending Tilly in a blink… but in recent months that dense, dark soul had been torn, stretched countless times to accommodate its new, ever-growing host.

Oberon’s eyes widened fractionally as he attempted to shrug off the attack and found a mountain where he had expected a mouse. The Corrupted king stumbled back, caught completely by surprise by the incredible violence radiating from such a weak creature, and for a moment Tilly thought he had him.

Then the king’s back arched and his eyes burst open as whatever was beyond them screamed out from the abyss. Its host’s face screwed up in pain as he matched its scream with his own insane shriek, channeling its hatred through the broken window that was his soul. His void-imbued Will shoved back against Tilly’s aural attack, pushing the jagged edges of his fractured mind against the core of Tilly’s being.

Brokenridge felt their clash from high above and roared his approval even as the air around him began exploding in wild fey magics, and he answered back with another bar of plasma, carving through more of their ranks. The remaining winged fey buzzed around him furiously, striking like bees with their dragon glass spears. Part of Tilly realized that the dragon was drawing as much fire as possible to keep the rest of the Hunt off them as their souls wrestled like bears filling the air between them with odd refractions of light and sound.

Tilly’s aura was incredibly dense, slamming against the king’s jagged defenses over and over with the weight of the incredible destruction he had personally caused. Oberon’s aura was a makeshift thrust of jagged-edged insanity, piercing through the center of Tilly’s attack, attempting to rend his core. The fey king had survived Epochs through the careful application of the point of his blade, and he leaned into that unyielding, sharp nature now, eyes screaming with hatred as he pressed against the weight of Tilly’s impossible presence.

Slowly, despite all of Tilly’s furious Will, Oberon’s counterattack was pressing through, piercing into Tilly’s core. Its edge was undeniable, but with that sharpness came brittleness. This was a being who had not bent for anyone in thousands of years, and that unyielding strength was a two-sided sword. His hatred, his refusal to bow shoved itself deeper into Tilly’s soul, causing a profound pain to bloom at his core as if it was being ripped in two. Tilly's growl of focus exploded into a scream as the king’s aura pierced the core of his identity. Soon, the very root of who he was would be cut, sawed by the many-toothed edge of Oberon’s mania.

Tilly's face screwed up in agony as he screamed his throat raw, yet despite the incredible pain, the weight crushing down on the fey king’s own soul did not let up. If anything it redoubled… and the bright light of insanity in Oberon’s eager eyes began to dim as fear crept into his soul at its cracking edges. This should have been the end. no creature could press such an attack and hope to preserve itself at the same time, and yet…

Tilly shoved even harder.

He had risked his life so many times in both lives that the threat of destruction did not cause him to shrink back in the least from the contest of Wills. He had risked everything to come this far. Not for the sake of power or personal ambition, but to protect those he loved.

Spiritual pressure built up between them as both beings pushed themselves far beyond what should have been possible. Tilly’s eyes were hard, implacable in need to win. His Will was steel, each heart connection he had formed in this new life another layer of strength forged into the spiritual manifestation of his determination. He would not give up, even if Oberon’s attack rent his core.

Then, with a sound like shattering glass, the pressure ceased, and the fey king’s attack splintered under the undeniable weight of Tilly’s responsibility.

Oberon’s scream cut off. Whether in fury or fear, Tilly could not know. Relief flooded his soul at the sudden absence of pressure. But before he could capitalize on the shift in advantage a cold blade slid smoothly in between his ribs, piercing the center of his heart. Tilly looked down in confusion as the fey king’s rapier embedded up to the hilt in his chest.

He had felt the fey king’s aura shatter as he abandoned his spiritual defenses. How could he have attacked following such a backlash? But as Tilly slowly looked back up, he understood. Tilly had destroyed the last pieces of who Oberon, king of the fey had been. Now, a new creature’s face hovered inches from Tilly, who watched in profound pain as the Corrupted fey’s black eyes burst into miniature horrors of eldritch writhing.

“You have unleashed your doom.” The thing whispered from Oberon’s mouth, so close he might have leaned in for a kiss. Tilly felt his Health plummeting as the sword shifted inside him, but that didn’t stop him from smiling. With all of his remaining strength, he snaked his arms around the nightmare unfolding before him, pulling back his lips and revealing red teeth, in a death’s-head grin.

“That makes… two of us.” He coughed.

Then he activated everything in a move he had been mentally rehearsing for days.