The spatial mana around the monster was strong enough to prick at my skin. Mana-sense wise, it was as if someone had stuffed something right up my nose, leaving little room for other scents to filter through.

"Everyone retreat!" Ventus yelled.

He sent six twister orbs into the monster's legs, but several tentacles lashed out and blocked the attacks. Three orbs managed to drill through, but the damage was minimal when it encountered the legs. When they exploded, the cuts on the monster's flesh barely widened.

Sereza tugged me backwards, and we ran off toward the guild hall. It may not have been the wisest decision, but there was an exit on the other side of the building. If we had to run, we could use the building as cover while we escaped to a different part of the city.

Before we could make it a few meters, something heavy crashed from the sky, sending us tumbling through the air. My familiars called out, but I didn't have time to look as whatever hit the earth was sent backwards into the legs of the newly emerging monster.

I turned and saw glowing water flowing upwards into a serpentine body, beginning to recover. Wrapping around the giant's legs, it began to coil upwards. The monster attempted to grab the serpent, but the spinning torrent comprising Callen's body rebuffed its fingers.

More tentacles snaked around, ready to bury Callen under a veritable tide of mucus-covered flesh, only for him to open his jaws and send out a beam of water that tore a hole through the titan's face.

The titan reacted by clamping its hand onto Callen's head and forcing his head downwards and away. The beam continued cutting a line through its shoulder, nearly severing its right arm before Callen closed his mouth.

The titan's body was a mess. A waterfall of black ichor cascaded out of the massive injury. Several tentacles along its body lashed angrily in the air, some smacking into other tentacles. It was chaos.

Ventus didn't give me any more time to stare in awe at the battle of giants; he reached down and wrapped his arm around both Sereza's and mine. He pointed his trident toward the hall entrance and activated his movement skill, sending us flying forward in a surge of roaring wind.

We sailed over the earthen barricades and barely avoided the metal spikes lining the upper edge. His skill stopped when we passed the double doors, and we crashed into the ground. The wind torrent cushioned most of the damage, but my breath was knocked out of my lungs as my chest hit the floor.

Ugh-hack! Fuck. Ugh-hack, More wet coughing spilled out, and I didn't have the energy to glare.

I raised my head and turned towards the entrance where the rest of the squad was swarming in, the background behind them looking like a warzone as stone and wood shrapnel rained down. Callen's body briefly appeared, crashing into another building before he retaliated by wrapping his tail around a fallen tree and whipping it at the titan.

The tree impaled the titan on the lower side, but the monster ignored the pain if it ever felt any at this point, and ripped it out. He returned the large projectile with enough force to turn the tree into shrapnel as it failed to hit the captain.

By the time the rest of the squad entered, more than a few were injured by being caught in the crossfire. I knew the healer was exhausted, so I told Áine to go ahead and start healing any of the injuries that looked dangerous.

I tried to stand up, but my leg was shaky. Thankfully, Ventus reached down, hooked his hand under my armpit, and hauled me up.

With a thankful nod, I turned towards the crowd and raised my voice. "Áine is coming around to heal you, dangerous injuries only. If you can pull out anything lodged in the wound, it'd make the healer easier and cut down the cost on mana."

"Listen to what he says. Do not delay!" Ventus shouted.

I turned to him. "Thank you."

He shook his head. "No, thank you. Natalia is running low. With this, we can prevent mana fatigue from worsening."

"Don't worry about it. I'd be dead without you guys, so there's no point in hoarding my mana when I can use it more effectively elsewhere."

He looked ready to say something else, but instead, he shook his head and walked away, ordering his people to begin reinforcing the entrance.

I looked around and checked the breach. It was still there; the mana radiating off the ceiling was lesser than the breach outside.

Maybe there's nothing left to power it.

I lowered my head and saw Sereza bandaging a jagged cut on her arm. I frowned. "When did that happen?"

Sereza grunted. "After we fell. Something small, probably a stone or something, cut into my right side. Here, look." She turned and raised her arm, showing a jagged rip into her leather jacket. "Luckily, it only hit my arm."

"Yeah. I can have Áine heal that up if you need. My mana regeneration is high enough. It shouldn't be too much of a problem."

She stopped bandaging her arm and stared. After a long pause, she shook her head and continued. "Nah, it hurts, but my arm is functional. And seriously, how much mana does your fairy have? Aren't summons based off a portion of your mana pool? She should be empty by now."

"Eh. She is, but she's pulling from my own. And I can afford to supply it."

"And he says my skills are unfair," she whispered.

"What?"

"Nothing."

I chuckled and was about to quip back when Zharia squawked in alarm. She quickly pecked at my ear, and I turned to see what she saw.

At the front of the entrance, another darker form filled the entrance view. A few people looking outside didn't react.

Fuck! They can't see in the dark.

"Incoming! Back away from th-"

A loud roar drowned out my words. It was deep and rumbly, with a second higher-pitched squeal blending in.

Somebody raised a hand and shot a pale-blue orb that zipped out the door. The behemoth monster ignored it as it flew behind it. The ball exploded, transforming the night sky into muted daylight.

As the dark no longer concealed the monster's body, it revealed its full form, prompting some alarmed shouts. The monster pushed its head closer and snapped at the nearest barricade, reducing it to rubble.

I clenched my fist and began backing up. The monster's long body started to slide closer. Its tentacles ended in serrated teeth that cut sharp lines into the stone of the building's steps.

It opened its jaws wider, and a black haze started to build in its mouth. Ventust swung his trident forward, and the wind he created pushed the gas backwards. The monster was unfazed and started spewing out more of the stuff to combat the wind.

Tentacles swung forward and nearly clipped one of the squadmates. A quick barrage of metal spikes pinned the tentacle to the ground, preventing the beastkin from being torn into.

Ventus got into a throwing stance this time and activated a different skill. He poured enough mana to disrupt the blanket that the spatial mana cast over the room.

He launched the trident, and it sailed through the air unimpeded as it aimed for the monster's open mouth. The black haze seemed to rise to the monster's commands, and it condensed before its jaws, meeting the thrown weapon in a clash of mana.

The green wind unravelled, and the black haze started to flutter. Another flare from the monster caused the trident to detonate its charge, and the weapon boomeranged back into Ventus' hands.

With the explosion so close to the monster's face, its head rocked backwards, causing the tentacles encroaching the entrance to freeze and dig in to keep the monster stable.

"Prepare to retreat to the exit. Those with crowd control, slow down the monster!" Ventus ordered.

Ventus kept his mana channeled into whatever skill allowed him to conjure the wall of wind. He stood still as the rest of the squad began to retreat to the far side where the hole made for the civilians' escape stood open.

Several tall earth walls began rising up, and a field of ice formed on the ground before it. I doubted it'd be much use stopping the thing, but anything was better than nothing.

The monster shook its head and roared again. More tentacles slapped the ground, and the monster must have been angry because a tremor shook beneath our feet.

One person slipped, and the tank was there, his sword stabbing into the approaching limb. He bashed away another with his shield and threw the person backwards. The healer caught him and began dragging him to his feet.

Another tremor caused cracks to appear, but it wasn't from the monster. A torrent of water caught the monster's head and yanked it backwards.

Callen was there, his mouth clamped down on the monster's own. He used his tail to pick up the large iron spike that became dislodged after the initial clash with the titan.

Callen's body propelled the spike up and shot it into the monster's eye. It roared and curled around the captain, sending the two into a death roll.

Their wrestling for dominance caused the stairs to crack and split open while the building's walls began to fall inward.

A beam of water shot out of Callen's mouth, but the monster used the multiple tentacles along its body to slice into Callen's form. The beam cut off, and his head wavered before it reshaped itself.

I wasn't sure how Callen's transformation skill worked, but that must have chipped away a decent chunk of mana. If the captain ran out of mana, the fight would become less 'kaiju fight' and more 'David vs. Goliath.'

To make it worse, and to everyone else's horror inside the hall, the titan from before came charging at the two. Its lumbering footfalls created an earthquake with each step. The snake titan rolled in a way that exposed Callen's side, and the bipedal titan used both clawed hands to slice through his body.

Callen shuddered, and the water around his body exploded outward, sending both titans flying. His body reformed, but it was noticeably smaller than before. Callen slid slowly, his body coiling beneath him as the two titans approached.

"By the gods... The captain is losing..."

I wasn't sure who said that, but I agreed. There was no way anyone tier-two and below was supposed to survive something like this. But if a pink rift pushed a tier-one into producing tier-two champions, then a tier-two rift could easily spawn tier-three monsters.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

My attention shifted away from the fight when I heard a series of popping sounds echoing from the ceiling and briefly looked up, only to turn away. Reality was splitting again; this time, I saw more than just distorted space. Behind the cracks of fractured reality was the void and its ever-consuming nothingness. Now that I was more mana sensitive, I felt the void like a black hole sucking all the mana from the room.

The mana disappeared once it entered the void, and I could feel nothing from within it.

I glanced back at the epic fight outside the double doors and growled. A flare of energy flowed over my body. Beside me, Sereza groaned, and Ventus stumbled forward. A few others whined until I saw Giyanni's barrier pop into place, protecting most of the squad.

Turning to where I felt the flare appear, I found the ether crystal on the floor. The mana inside activated as the crystal glowed bright pink.

I glanced from the crystal to outside and back to the crystal.

"Ventus," I said.

"What, Cyrus?" Ventust asked as he struggled to stand.

Giyannia moved closer, with everyone else crowding together as she slowly collected the rest of the squad. She ignored where I stood since I was nearest to the crystal and unbothered by its effects.

Sereza looked at me with concern as she stood next to Ventus. "Cyrus?"

I pointed towards the fracturing of reality above us. "If that swallows you, it'll send you hurtling through the void where you'll come out the other side a broken, bleeding mess. Whatever happens, we need to end this rift before reality becomes undone. We can't afford that, not here."

"Rift? What rift?" Ventus chimed in.

Sorry, buddy. It doesn't matter if you somehow awaken.

"What would happen if the ether crystal was to break?"

"It'd stop working?"

Ventus frowned and crossed his arms. "It'd blow up. The crystal shell is the container and conduit, but the energy stored inside would be enough to destroy this entire building and the surrounding area."

At this, I grinned. "Good. Then, I can absorb the spatial mana here and use it to blow up the crystal. We just need to get me close enough to deliver the payload."

Sereza crossed her arms. "This is a lot of mana; you'd cripple yourself."

"I can recover. I always do."

Another beam of water hit the building. This time, it sliced downwards. People threw up hasty barriers and barely blocked the water from breaking through. When the beam stopped, there was a loud creaking sound followed by the left door falling to the ground.

The people who had blocked the attack slumped forward; their mana drained low. Everybody was experiencing some level of mana fatigue.

"It doesn't matter what happens after we finish. Just try to make sure I don't die." I reached down and picked up the crystal. In my hand, I felt it erode the mana around my arm, and I gritted my teeth. The buzzing shifted to angry ants skittering frantically up and down my limb.

I tucked it into the pouch on my waist, the crystal too big to fit, but it would do for now.

Ventus uncrossed his arms and reached to place a hand on my shoulder. I tensed up, expecting him to say no, but instead, he stared me directly in the eyes. I couldn't tell what expression he was making, his face entirely neutral.

After another three seconds, he removed his hand and smiled. "Very well, Cyrus. I am not in a position to turn down help for our city and its people. What do you need me to do?"

I smiled back. "Let me absorb the energy and help me explode the crystal. It'd be great if you could ensure I'm out of the blast radius when the thing goes off."

I glanced at Sereza, but she kept her face emotionless and resheathed her daggers. "If we survive this, I promise to buy you a drink."

"I'll hold you to it."

Ventus had one of the squad members raise a couple of platforms I could use to get closer to the ceiling. The poor man looked ready to pass out but complied without complaint.

After he raised five platforms, I hopped on up and flexed my claws. Standing this close to the dimensional breach was an interesting feeling. It was hot and cold, and the sight made my stomach twist. To look at the void hurt my eyes, so I kept them closed.

Áine joined Zharia on my shoulders, and I pulled them both in for a hug. I lightly pressed them to my chest and returned them to my soulspace. I gave Sereza a quick thumbs-up and turned away before I could see her reaction.

This feels stupid, but what isn't at this point? If I wanted to avoid being dumb, I'd have turned around and walked away the moment I saw the pink portal.

I reached both hands upwards and into the breach. In my vision, I saw them bend and turn in three different directions. It didn't hurt, but it made my arms feel disconnected.

I let that feeling encompass my thoughts and reached a mental hand out, allowing the mana to wash over it. Each wave, every pulse, helped me get a grasp on the breach and all the different energies mixed in.

Letting my senses hone in on the spatial mana and not the void energy took a while. Longer than I wanted to waste when the tremors of Callen's fight could be felt even on top of these platforms.

I pulled and let the mana sink into my bones. It pushed through the crystal and into the fur. It travelled downwards till it reached bone, and I felt my arms vibrate. Biting down on my lip, I forced the energy to direct itself into the channels dedicated to absorbing energy.

When the energy started to fill the receptacle inside my chest, I watched as it began to fill more and more. By the halfway point, I started to worry since the flow hadn't lessened in the slightest.

Once I approached the final ten percent, I started to feel full. The spatial mana continued to pour in, and I felt heavy.

"Magnus, we have to condense it."

I received a vague image of him placing his paw on the container holding the mana, and then I felt the mana squeeze. The process was uncomfortable; some of the mana escaped my throat, and I coughed.

A mist of twisting clear energy littered with random specks of light exited my mouth and was immediately sucked upwards into the void above.

I shut my jaw and tried again, trying my best to stem the flow long enough for Magnus to make room. My arms started to tremble, and I saw the damage the mana left behind as it flowed up my arms.

More mana started coming in, and I tried to instinctively pull away this time, only to find my hands stuck. It was like molasses, and I moved inch by inch. The influx of mana never ceased, and I divided my attention, one half attempting to free my arms while the other half worked to condense the mana as quickly as possible.

Just when I thought I was about to explode, a loud pop rang out, throwing my hands free. I stumbled and windmilled my arms. As I was about to fall off the platform, the person who raised the earthen steps held out a hand, and another smaller platform appeared behind me.

With my balance regained, I slumped forward and looked up. More pieces of reality had succumbed to the void, and the glaring nothingness began to spread slowly.

No matter what happens now, we can't afford to stay here.

I made my way to the platform's edge and slowly dropped down. My insides burned, and I felt a cold numbness weigh down my body. It was funny to think that mana made me cold, but my body reacted by acting as if my mana channels were on fire.

Two different kinds of agony surged at the same time.

Ventus helped me down the last step, and he nodded grimly as we made our way to the entrance. Sereza waved from where she stood, and I waved back before Ventus directed me to the side where the door had fallen off.

More cracks were spreading from the damage Callen had done, but I ignored that and focused on the utter destruction of the city before us. The buildings were demolished and wrecked things for several blocks. Fallen debris was everywhere, and large craters littered the road.

"Let's go," Ventus said.

He hooked an arm around my waist and activated his movement skill. The shroud of wind covered our bodies, and we took off, corkscrewing closer to the titans.

We landed, and he helped keep me on his feet, the disturbance having caused me to nearly retch. He didn't wait for me to compose myself and activated his skill for the second time.

We flew straight and upwards, landing on a half-destroyed manor with several chunks ripped away. A large footprint indented the ground, giving us a vague idea of what had happened.

Callen and the titans chased after each other, Callen expertly dodging attack after attack while flinging more pieces of the city like cannon fire. Yet, despite his efforts, the fight was a two-on-one, and he was too slow to dodge the bipedal titan from stomping its clawed foot through his tail. His form wavered and exploded, sending the titan reeling. The serpent, once twenty-five meters long, had shrunk to approximately seventeen meters.

He wasn't the only one who had suffered damage. Callen must have focused on the bipedal titan's injuries because half of its skull was missing. The monster had wrapped its tentacles around its head to prevent its brain from leaking out. Sporting several injuries, the snake titan had several of its appendages missing, while an elongated hole openly bled black ichor onto the ruined street.

I held the ether crystal in my arms and tried to keep it away from Ventus, who was struggling to stand so close. "Ventus. What now?"

"We already sent a message to him, so he should know we are trying to do something. But I'm not sure how to get the crystal close."

We watched together as the two clashed with Callen once more. A small building was used like an arrow and thrown with the full might of the bipedal titan. Anytime Callen tried to swerve and dodge, the snake titan followed him, matching his movements and preventing him from leaving. Throughout it all, a swarm of tentacles lashed out, each one aiming to cut into the captain's body.

I was hoping that Ventus could use his skills to send the crystal forward, but with the chaos, there was no way he could deliver the crystal through that mess.

A sharp pain in my chest caused me to fall to one knee. I looked inside, and the energy within was hammering away at the container. There was a hairline crack near the bottom, and I wanted to groan.

I have to finish this now. I won't survive this if I don't."

"How long can you keep us in the air?"

Ventus gripped his trident with white knuckles. "I'm running low on mana, so I have enough to keep us moving for ten seconds."

"A sharp pain shot through me, followed by a crack on the opposite side. I pointed above Callen, grunting, "Let's go, there—" My words broke into a cough, blood staining my lips as another fracture formed. 'We're running out of time."

I grabbed onto Ventus' belt and used it to help me to my feet. He extended his trident forward and sent the remaining mana left in his pool into the shroud around us. We took off, and I kept my eyes trained on Callen's serpent head weaving through buildings.

Nine seconds.

Callen swerved to the right and cut a corner. He steamrolled over a small boutique, ignoring the large rock thrown after him.

Eight seconds.

Three more cracks appeared as the snake titan sent out a wave of black fog. The attack corroded away everything in its path, whether it be stone, wood, or metal.

Seven Seconds.

Ventus directed us upward and shifted us slightly left. His skin paled, and I could feel his chest stiffen.

Six seconds.

Callen responded by wrapping his tail around a leafy tree and using it as a fan to push against the fog.

Five Seconds.

Nine cracks appeared inside my chest, and I ignored the fistful of blood trailing behind us.

Four Seconds.

We were directly above where the two titans were converging on Callen. Callen was coiling up his serpent body, gathering it underneath him.

Three Seconds.

I launched the ether crystal downward and watched as Ventus exerted a last-second spurt of mana to spike the crystal with a gust of wind.

Two Seconds.

I opened my mouth and opened the pressure cooker that was inside my chest. The condensed spatial mana rose into my throat. As the mana rushed outward, the container trembled, and the entire front side turned into a spiderweb of broken lines.

One Second.

Callen twisted his head and launched himself backwards, away from the titans. His tail served as a spring to fire him into the air. The titans lunged for him, one with its hands and the other with its jaws.

The energy inside my mouth broke from my control and turned into a beam so condensed that it cut through the remnant ether left behind the crystal's wake.

Zero

The ether crystal was next to the bipedal titan's head when the beam hit the crystal. For a moment, everything around the crystal froze, including both titans. Callen managed to get half his body away, but the back half dragged him to the ground.

As Ventus kept us sailing across the sky to land on a nearby roof, I watched as Callen's body lost its glow and shot his human form into the ruins of what looked like an inn.

His body was the last thing I saw before the ether crystal exploded.

The shockwave disrupted Ventus' skill, and we tumbled through the air, just short of the roof's edge. There was the sound of what I could only describe as thunder shaking my eardrums and causing them to rattle the crystal shell covering my head.

For a moment, the blastwave suspended our bodies in midair, and then a force grabbed them and tried to pull us toward the explosion.

We fell about five meters before Ventus hooked his trident into a window. My body rattled, and I felt my neck threaten to snap.

His trident broke the wood as it came free. Ventus quickly planted his trident into another window before we fell even further, and he tightened his grip on my waist.

As we dangled several meters above the ground, air suction pulled us like a kite on a string. The place where the titans had been was now a fractured collage of images that made my eyes bleed.

The void grew and expanded outwards, all of reality being swallowed whole.

It's just like before.

The force tugging us in grew stronger, and the street splintered into five as lines of nothingness raced across the ground.

"Ventus!" I shouted through the high-pitched thrumming, my vocal cords barely functioning after the attack.

"What!" He yelled back.

"I'm sorry!"

He had enough strength left to look down and meet my eyes. He had on a ferocious grin, showing more emotion than I had ever seen the man show before. "Don't be, Cyrus! You did what what you could. Even if we go down, the others can escape!"

I shook my head. "I'm sorry. You don't understand. I'll probably survive, but you won't."

His smile never left his face. "What comes shall come. Lady Ysanna shall guide my soul when this body succumbs."

I laughed at that. Even if my sides hurt, I laughed at how insane his conviction was, even till the end. It didn't matter if the world was crumbling beneath our feet. It was inspiring and insane, making the incoming pain worth it.

The pressure increased, and his trident was ripped from his hands. Before we started falling, I summoned the last of my strength and pushed Ventus into the window. The last thing he saw was my mask, giving it the widest smile it could show.

"Cyrus!"

Now that's too damn familiar.

I mentally chuckled, my lungs finally giving out, and I felt blood fill my throat.

As I began to fall, I undid the Reflective Coat of the Mirrored Beast. Magnus appeared, and I hugged him and forced him into my soulspace. I felt rejection and worry, but I cut off the link, silencing the thoughtspeech.

His weight settled in my soulspace, and I spread my arms wide as I fell to the void chasm beneath me. When I closed my eyes, I let the world fall away as I couldn't help but involuntarily tense up, ready for pain to come.

"Oh no, you don't! As if I would let the mortal who destroyed my city and saved my people escape so easily."

The voice was feminine, and I heard a scoff followed by a deep chuckle from beside it.

I tried to open my eyes, but then I found myself being pulled somewhere else, and my consciousness slipped away for the millionth time since coming to this world.