"Why... There's a bug net in here?" Billy said, breaking Jolene out of the rabbit hole she was chasing.

They'd leap frogged through three more cabinets finding increasing signs of Tendril and Partial propaganda, both anti and pro. The Breakers started making their own deals for goods with the Zebelos and more of a spotlight was shone on Sargon specifically. A suspiciously bright one. There was even a Conference called to discuss the now-elemental Faction leader's attempts to 'poach talent' as the transcript of the meeting stated. There was a growing rhetoric for a 'reborn humanity'. It stunk of an Aberrant's agent finally playing its hand, like Kirby had done to Wildwood.

"Huh?"

"Yeah, someone stuck a metal butterfly net in the bottom of this drawer."

"I found an empty bean can on one of the newer cabinets," Jolene said, just as confused. "I don't think they keep too close an eye on these records. It's honestly a miracle they kept as many as they have."

"True. The end of the world probably shifted some priorities. This might even be from before the Fall since--"

"WILLIAM!" The voice set the whole building shaking more than the hurricane's thunder had done. The word, however, set both would-be archivists on edge. Jolene had her Gator Gauntlet equipped in seconds and Billy had his hands wrapped tightly around the bug net as he drew his cloud stuff close. "HELP."

Something in the second word brought recognition to Billy's eyes, and he tore his way out of the office and back down the hallway. Jolene struggled to keep up with the pseudo-flight the elf Partial was capable of, but she made it to the main Ward tower just as Billy exploded through the trapdoor leading to the actual room housing the lighthouse-like emplacement for Hec's sliver. Jolene pushed her way up the ladder and through the splinters that remained of the door to watch Billy pinning four different Cloth Muscles to the ground with his clouds while two remained on the wrap-around balcony of the structure. The reason why those two hadn't been pinned was obvious, as the elf and demoness were working to disrupt a swarm of elementals circling the Crystal Ward and hadn't even noticed the arrival of Billy.

"What happened to Hec?" Billy asked, his usual meek tone replaced with the frost of combat.

"W-we don't know what happened!" Throk coughed out, flames curling off his body as he tried to combat Billy's magic. It was somewhat effective, but the Quotient difference was on full display. The Cloth Muscles were no higher than Q4. Even the elf fighting outside was just Q5. They were uninjured, but his Gift was called for a reason.

"I knew you were trouble!" Astrid yelled, pulsing with ice that banished Billy's clouds by turning them into snow for a moment, allowing her to rise only for Jolene to appear. Her Gator Gauntlet had its teeth held inches from the lizardwoman's throat, forcing her to stop resisting.

"What's going on, Billy?" Jolene asked through the comm-plant.

"That was Hec talking," he replied. "But I haven't linked this splinter with..."

As he spoke, a crystal hand as big around as a torso sprouted from the Metier Crystal shining in the middle of the tower. The change seemed to scare the Cloth Muscles even more than the elf detaining them, halting their weak struggles in place. The limb moved, fingers curling until it pointed at Billy before twisting unnaturally towards the northwest. Jolene blinked all three of her eyelids until the oddity registered.

"That fire is closer," Jolene said, aloud. It was in the exact same direction as they'd seen when the two of them had dove into the archive, except it was larger. Beyond that, there was not a single fire but instead a semi-linear trail of smoky breadcrumbs. They didn't reach far above the canopy, the hurricane's winds sweeping it into a low fog, but it was unnatural. Two or three fires, even in line with each other, could have been dismissed as stray lightning. More than a half dozen...

"What do we do?" Billy asked through the comm-plant, glaring at one of the Cloth Muscles when they tried to shift out of their confinement.

"Hec, are they people or monsters?" Jolene asked aloud.

"PEOPLE!" The sound was much louder within the Entity's chamber, causing everyone to flinch. However, the message got across.

Without needing to speak further, Jolene and Billy rushed out of the door and leapt over the balcony railing. A cluster of elementals tried to take the brief opening created by the confused Cloth Muscles, but they weren't ready for Jolene to unleash a in their midst. She didn't even bother to check what their exact Attunement, Refinement or Levels were --their size spoke for that to a small degree-- because they were instantly wiped out. The push-then-suction of her water bubble had each of the elementals collide and overlap, which brought their magics into discordant conflict.

Billy didn't bother trying anything more than increasing the rotation of his Djinn Legs to offset his fall, while he fashioned his into a cushion for Jolene. After catching Dai when they'd first contacted Ocala, the elf had worked tirelessly to fine tune his force-countering abilities. With an Air-based threat looming overhead, he'd expected more than one of his friends would need last minute assistance with a fall. For Jolene, and from only forty feet up, he didn't need much.

With their landing, Billy enacted the second part of the duo's quick response training. It had been on accident while training with some of the Cloth Muscles that Billy had discovered that his synergized with Jolene's in a way that cost them little mana but nearly tripled the mermaid's movement speed on land. As Billy hovered inches off the ground with the help of his legs and a few careful pushes from his , Jolene swam through the clouds he left trailing behind him.

The moment her mana touched the clouds, they fell in her magical purview and she was able to use that water to pull herself forward. Her nictitating membrane protected her eyes even as her fins flicked open and closed to bring their efficiency even higher. Once Billy had set their path, the pair picked up speed quick.

"Eyes open for elementals. Just because these people need help doesn't mean that the threat will be elementals," Jolene said through the comm-plant. Billy threw up a thumb from in front of her, his focus on driving the cloud car to their destination.

Before long they had flown over the crops and were zigzagging left and right to dodge the trees in their way. Thanks to their practice they'd discovered that Jolene couldn't take sharp corners unless their speed ejected her from the . She could blast her way through obstacles, and half powered pushed downed logs and low hanging branches out of their way. After only two minutes blazing a path through the forest, the source of the fires became readily available.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"Woah!"

"What in the..."

A towering figure stood at the fore of a downed caravan. It was easily twenty feet standing up, its paws waving in the air for a moment before smashing down to the earth with enough force to throw mud several feet into the air despite the storm. There was a moment of discordance as fire blossomed from that muddy divot and blasted the creature back against the trees. In the brief pause the explosion caused, its information blossomed in Jolene's eyes before she glanced at Billy's hands.

The initial explosion wasn't the only one that rocked the area as a snarling creature stepped between the bear and the caravan. They were easily a match in size for Ronan, which in and of itself would have been intimidating without the rest of the features that the clearing smoke revealed. Thick scales cascaded down the creature's back, each glowing with inner fire that flickered with each breath. At least part of the plumes of smoke they'd seen in the distance were a result of the creature as two backward sweeping horns spewed ash and brimstone around them. As the wind from the explosion faded, a crown of golden brown hair covered the rest of the creature's back and Jolene was finally able to connect the dots. She'd thought it was a giant at first, then a demon, but then landed on the obvious answer.

"Dragon," Billy said breathlessly, the elf bringing them down to a skidding landing at the edge of the cracked roadway they'd broken out of the woods on.

"More than that," Jolene said. "But we need to focus."

The nudge was enough to snap Billy to attention. She gave herself a few moments to truly assess the battle they'd arrived at. There were at least a dozen low leveled people huddled around the caravans, a few children being sheltered bodily. Jolene noted that there were only a few men in the group and each looked more wound than person, yet they brandished whatever weapons they could towards the bear and the sky. Even with the choking aeroforming that the draconian was actively performing, the elementals sensed prey and were attempting to make off with the weak.

Focusing on the beast that had first drawn their attention, she watched it rising to its feet as if it hadn't taken a miniature pyroclastic blast to the chest. The mermaid paid close attention as the burned flesh shed itself, scabbing for a few seconds before new fur started to cover the burns. It was ridiculous, to say the least. Ron's right. Life creatures are bullshit.

"Drop me at the bear, cover the people!" Jolene shouted and said through the comm-plant, not trusting her voice to carry clearly in the mess they'd landed in.

Billy didn't question it, sweeping an arm forward as a ramp of clouds formed a beeline for the fifteen foot bear. A manifested to the elf's right side, sucking him up into the ear with a pop that launched him up as much as forward in the direction of the caravan. She kept half an eye on the Party line of her Status before diving into the clouds and activating both of her Imbue Skills. did what it did, pulling her forward like a magnetic pull towards the water she desired, while swept up the water her passing formed around her form. The heavier, physically and magically, she became the more cost but it was worth it.

She smashed into the bear like a ton of bricks, letting her water lead at the last second and subsequently using it to cushion the force of the impact. The creature growled, not as heavily affected by the blow as the fiery explosion, but it couldn't ignore physics as its stable footing was used against it and it pitched back against the tree. As the water doused the creature, she focused on her Gauntlet and Amplified her into . It was a costly expenditure, leaving her at half mana after the opener of the fight, but she couldn't complain. Well, maybe a little. That full powered attack would normally kill whatever it hits but this thing is laughing it off. The pounding hail that had formed at her Skill's behest only managed to keep the creature stunned but she'd take any amount of time she could.

"Friends!" she called towards the draconian, which despite her arrival hadn't moved from where they'd made their stand. Upon looking at their very-much lizardfolk like features, she could immediately read the bone deep exhaustion in them. Their scaly jaws were shorter than the Water Attuned, but it hung open as they panted in time with the smoking stacks that were its horns. A smoldering crystal was solidly embedded in their sternum, veins of orange crawling from it up to the draconian's face like a strange tattoo that resembled a spell chain to an astonishing degree.

"Took you... cloth assholes... long enough..." the draconian huffed, their voice exhausted but decidedly cracking with the turn of puberty. He's just a kid! Jolene didn't have the time to really process that. The bear had already shaken off the worst of her attack and she could feel its growl through the ground.

"Are there any more things attacking you all?" Jolene asked, turning to face the bear after checking that Billy was doing well. A ceiling height cloud had mixed in with the draconian's ash to cover the caravans, some combination of the elf's , , and Skills making it a nightmare for the elementals to pierce before shattered the core of the bravest and dispersed the hesitant.

"You don't think this bastard is enough? Him and his friends have been chasing us for hours!" the draconian roared, its voice coming a bit more steadily. Jolene didn't ask how they'd managed to survive that long if the bear looked as unbothered by their attacks as it was.

"Is it alone?" Jolene asked firmly, readying around her hands. She considered Amplifying the Skill, but even with her and Billy's prodigious regeneration the fight was going to be tight.

"Yes! Yes, it's alone! We've killed it at least three time. Now what do we do!?" The draconian's voice cracked, a hint of the desperation they'd been keeping at bay resurfacing.

The options floated through Jolene's mind quickly. They could retreat, but moving the people at the caravan would be slow. It was unlikely they'd be able to hold down the bear long enough to escort them while covering against the elementals swarming. Even if they did, it would be a close thing. She vaguely remembered reading somewhere that pre-Fall bears could run almost 30 miles per hour. She didn't want to test what a twenty foot, Q6, Regenerative one would be capable of. Of course, the Cloth Muscles at the Crystal Ward would be a huge boon against the creature but they were relatively low level. This was going to take muscle, even if they didn't have the exact damage composition that would give them that.

"I have some ideas!" Jolene said, tightening her grip around her Gator Gauntlet. "Do you have any attacks that don't just burn directly?"

"I only have two attacks, lady, but yes. Watch out!" The draconian dove forward, knocking Jolene to the ground, as a branch flew through the air right in their direction. The spell chain she'd been holding released, and an orb of water three feet across detonated slightly off target of the bear.

Jolene didn't wait to be targeted again. "Keep moving, I'll draw its attention so you hit it with whatever you've got. And keep throwing out more of that ash if you can!"

That was all the breath she had before she squared up with the bear. Even on all four it was nearly ten feet in height, and the mermaid could tell there was a primal intelligence in its eyes. The bear knew what it was about, and it planned to bash its targets against the wall that was its regenerative magics. Jolene slipped into the mindset she'd practiced for the Mage Dance. It wasn't exactly the same, since the routine she'd worked to perfect was a mana hog, but she leapt forward with helping her slide over the mud. When the bear tried to stomp forward, a double whammy of and concussed the living hell out of the beast.

The next breath, Jolene was within striking range of the bear.