“Hmm, why did that tree uprooting itself not come up in our list of back-up plans.” Metilia released the dome. “I don’t have a large amount of mana left. Tahir, your blade.” Tahir gave her a questioning look, but unsheathed the sword and motioned to hand it to her. She placed her hand above the blade and cast a spell. Tahir nearly dropped it when he saw the blade glowing orange, but the molten heat did not extend to the handle or the guard. “Another feature of my enchantment. It won’t last long, however. I’ll use my remaining mana to fire from afar.”

“I can help too!” Theo chimed in. “I made sure to bring a couple extra potions in case I get unbalanced, but I can cast spells this way. I got your back.”

“Do try to keep up, contractor.” The traveler pulled on their cane, revealing a blade hidden on the inside. “I haven’t been to Itera in quite a while, and there is much I’d like to see. Far too much for you to meet your end here!”

The four of them steeled themselves as the void-corrupted treant approached.

Before it reached them, Tahir and the traveler rushed ahead and split up to circle the treant. The Traveler’s thrusting sword-cane didn't do too much, but Tahir’s molten blade with an aura-enhanced swing left deep marks across the already burnt wood. He wished that he could bond with the earth spirit to give him an even heavier swing, but his mana wouldn’t recharge fast enough to do so. He only had his aura to rely on. Thankfully, they weren’t fighting the treant at full power. Smoke rose from fires in its branches toward the top, and it swung a slower, but notably more powerful arm-branch than before. Though it didn’t kill it, the explosion from the oil severely damaged it.

A second swing came toward the Traveler, who blinked away before it could connect. It turned to swing again, and four bolts of magic slammed into it from a retreating Metilia. Tahir cut into it multiple times, trying to get the most out of the rapidly fading heat from Metila’s spell. When he saw it turning toward him and went dodged back, something pulled him back in place and nearly made him fall over. Looking down, he saw a black root had snaked around his leg when he wasn’t looking. “Shit, this thing can control its roots!” He warned the others, though the treant turned toward him.

With one massive log of an arm it slammed down onto him. Gathering all of his remaining aura into his arms, he swung his sword to meet and divert the branch to the side, sending up dirt as it collided with the ground. This gave the Traveler time to swing around and grab onto Tahir, teleporting away with some difficulty before the other arm could turn both of them into paste.

The Traveler blinked them ten feet away, but slipped, sending both of them to the ground. The treant wasted no time lumbering over to them, even ignoring more bolts from Metilia striking it. A massive orb of fire slammed into it before it could reach them, staggering it long enough for Tahir and the traveler to stand up.

Tahir looked back, and saw Theo tossing a potion bottle away and conjuring another powerful ball of fire. It looked unstable, and so did she. The flame looked like it would explode right next to her, and she had the same appearance as one of her relapses, eyes and hair glowing a burning orange while the rain around her evaporated. She fired off the orb to have it slam into the treant and immediately started conjuring another one. That had successfully caught its attention enough to cause it to start rushing toward Theo.

“It’s resistant to most magic because of the void-corruption, but fire seems to be effective still!” Metilia called, rushing over to Tahir and the Traveler as Theo bolted, tossing fire bolts at the treant. “Theo temporarily unbalanced herself, but it won’t be long before she loses control of her aura and won’t be able to cast any more spells. If it’s still chasing her when that happens…” she trailed off, but reached for Tahir’s sword again to recast her spell to heat up the metal. “We’ll need another good swing to take it out, do you have the aura?”

“Not sure.” Deflecting the strike took almost everything out of him, and the space still slowed his regeneration.

“I believe we may find the solution if we look to the skies.” The Traveler offered. The two looked to him, and Tahir gasped as he realized what they meant.

“Right, okay, I should have enough for that. Hopefully. It might get messy otherwise.”

Metilia hadn’t realized what they meant, but didn’t care to ask. “Theo! Bring it back here!” She called. Theo turned and started running toward the group, leaving steaming footsteps behind quickly covered by the rampaging treant.

“I c-can’t cast anymore!” She shouted to them. Tahir, the Traveler, and Metilia shifted to let Theo through and she fumbled through her bag for a potion.

“Take your medicine, we’ll finish it from here.” Metilia waved her staff and cast a spell, conjuring a thick panel in front of the treant which stopped it in its tracks with a loud thud. Immediately, cracks formed from the impact, and void corruption siphoning off the magic. “That’s all I have left. It’s up to you two!”

"Understood!” The Traveler put two hands on Tahir’s shoulders, and then teleported him several dozen feet into the air. Rather than his blade, he focused all of his remaining aura into his aura shield, and the sword created an orange line through the air as he fell down toward the treant. Said treant swung and shattered the magic panel with a heavy swing, but before it could begin its chase anew, Tahir brought the full force of his heated blade straight down across its trunk. As he hit the ground, he felt the aura shield buckle, then shatter, and then felt a sharp pain throughout his body as he rolled across the ground.

He scrambled up as fast as his legs would allow, but found it unnecessary. The treant tried to take a step, but collapsed in a heap as the massive cut across the trunk destabilized the magic animating it.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

The silence came over the forest, broken only by the torrential downpour that grew in intensity over the course of the fight. Theo had a potion in her hands, but slowly and shakily brought it back to her bag. The raging fire element within her seemed to bend to the water coming from the rain. Enough for her to regain control of her aura at the very least. With a deep breath, she exhaled the remaining excess fire energy and calmed herself down.

An act that drew everyone’s attention to her. “A dragon.” Tahir said. “Never seen one myself, but I have to imagine that’s what it looks like when they breathe fire.”

“Truly akin to the great wyrms of old.” The traveler chimed in.

“I agree.” Metilia said. “Though it does make me imagine what the other elements look like when she does that.”

“Can we just get out of the rain please!”.

Metilia looked to Tahir and the Traveler. “Go with her to the ruins. I’ll be along shortly.”

“Right, the ruins, let’s go.” Tahir stumbled for a couple of steps, feeling pain spring up in several areas. He pulled out and drank one of the potions Callipho left for them, then caught his stride with the Traveler following behind him. They joined Theo at the clearing where the treant stayed before it uprooted itself, and then stepped around the still-burning remains of the other animated trees. “What do you even use that oil for.”

“Master Callipho used it for high heat reactions that started quickly, but ones he couldn’t prepare beforehand. Some things need to go from super cold to super hot, and neither of us really use magic on that scale.” Theo looked down at her hands. “Well, that used to be true.”

The ruins stood a good 30 feet into the air, just slightly taller than most of the trees around it. With only one building, the trio circled the outer wall to find a massive set of stone doors. Tahir reached out, and hesitated before touching the door, unable to feel any magic coming from it. He also couldn’t see any handles or anything made for opening the door.

“Much as I would like to see how far this goes, I believe you are out of immediate danger.” The Traveler said.

Tahir looked back to them and, then back to the door, and shrugged. “Right - I’ll bring you out if we find something interesting.

“No need. I’ll revel in the feeling through our shared bond, contractor. Summon me when there is traveling to be done.” With a bow, the Traveler tipped their hat, and Tahir let the invocation dissipate. The Traveler disappeared with a smile on their face, and Tahir felt half of his mana pool re-open.

He had barely a quarter of it, so he used it to invoke the earth spirit. “Okay Theo. Let’s get this door open.” He moved to one side of the door, gesturing for Theo to take the other.

“As long as we can get out of this rain.” Theo sped over to the other side of the door. When her fire element was raging, the rain simply evaporated before it touched her, but now she looked soaked and thoroughly miserable.

Still, she didn’t complain at all about helping to get the door open. They pushed on either side of the door, their aura enhanced strength doing nothing at first, but a groan and shudder from the door signaled its movement. Seconds later, the door began to slide open. Once it moved a couple of feet, they shifted to inside the opening to push the doors as far open as they could get, then all but collapsed inside.

The room was empty save for a raised platform at the opposite end, but it had carvings and depictions along the inside walls. “How nice, a reprieve from the rain.” Metilia strode in. Theo looked to complain, but both she and Tahir saw the iskarai’s soaked form and refrained from saying anything. “Thank you for humoring me.”

Tahir changed from the earth spirit to fire as he sat up, and Theo waved Metilia over. “Come here Meti! Look.” She took in a deep breath, and her eyes changed to a glowing orange, waves of heat radiated from her, though not as intense as before. “I can heat up like Tahir does! It’s fine as long as I’m not using my aura for anything else.” She scooted away from Tahir to create some space between them. “Now come get dry.”

“If it is only while you control your aura, then you won’t be able to keep it up if you are sleeping or too low, no?” Metilia strode on over and settled in between them, sighing in relief at the two sources of heat that flanked her. “Nevertheless, it is appreciated.”

“Well, it’ll last until you’re dry. And we still have Tahir. He’s a space heater even when he’s sleeping.” Theo leaned against the wall, and closed her eyes. The three of them sat in silence for several seconds, listening to the sound of the rain, before she spoke once more. “What do you think that thing was for the Redclouds, Tahir?”

“Platinum. Easy.” Taking the whole ordeal in mind, a group of gold ranked members would have struggled against all the trees, in the void-corrupted space, if they had come across it without warning. “We had the benefit of being able to take our time and prepare, so it only seemed easier. This is the second time this month I’ve taken something I shouldn’t have with copious amounts of fire. I probably shouldn’t make a habit of it.”

“We’re alive aren’t we?” Theo said with a smile.

“In no small part thanks to your fire at the end, there, Theo.” Metilia cut in. “We only barely discussed using magic to dispose of unwanted elemental energy in your soul, I didn’t expect you to drink a potion to intentionally unbalance yourself.”

“It won’t be that useful until I stop losing control.” Theo muttered back. “I just…didn’t see anything else working on it, and we’d already used our oil.”

“We’ll work on your aura control in a less life-threatening setting. For now, try not to use your limited medicine and rely on getting lucky with the rain again.”

“Yes ma’am.” Theo’s head hung low.

Tahir listened to this exchange, but didn’t add anything to it, and focused on getting dry against the wall. They’d actually managed to take out the tree, and the main source of void-corruption in the clearing by using up all of the oil. The platform at the edge of the ruin likely offered some sorts of transport - he’d read about similar transports in already discovered Vudraninan ruins. They could take this moment to rest, and then see about exploring deeping into the ruin. Assuming that it didn’t take them into another plane, the traveler could make a fairly long range teleport for the four of them, and they had a much more precise control of destination in their jumps. As long as Tahir went in with half his mana pool, they had a measure of safety.

While he considered this, a loud crack and sizable tremor in the ground sent the three of them scrambling to their feet. A figure stood at the entrance to the ruin, towering over the trio and seemingly unaffected by the pouring rain. From their back, a set of large, batlike wings unfurled and flapped with a heavy gust as they stepped inside.