What we think of as 'the ground' is actually an extremely complex endeavour. We can get a bit obsessed about the pretty bits we see—the flowers, the grass, the trees, and suchlike—but if we scrape the surface, as it were, there's a pretty convoluted arrangement going on down there.

I dare say I would have found it all fascinating if I wasn't trying to make the whole FUCKING THING MOVE!

Are you open to a bit of advice, my dear?

"No, not at all, Big M. I think it's much better I blunder around like a lost soul, twiddling at knobs and fiddling with dials, whilst a massive goblin army runs straight at me. Nothing like discovery learning, is there?"

You only need to ask, my dear.

I dropped into my Artist's Studio, hoping the time dilation would give me enough time to figure out, literally, how to make a mountain out of a molehill.

"So, spill," I asked, a touch ungraciously.

If Merlin took offence, he hid it well. Probably until the next time he planned to punish me in a strange and esoteric way. You are trying to achieve your goal through brute strength. There will be a time - probably not too far in the future - when you can point at a patch of earth and tell it to rise into a column, and it will simply obey the force of your will.

"I'm sensing you're about to say today is not that day."

I am afraid not, my dear. However, he had obviously seen my face drop, we do tend to achieve more with honey than the stick, if I can mix my metaphor.

Having had one rather . . . creative partner who very much enjoyed the use of both, I was unsure of the validity of this argument. Nevertheless, I was open to seeing how this would play out. "Go on."

Arthur does not need a massive column to rise. All that is required is a relatively small area of this plan to raise by perhaps five feet. It's the sort of weft and wain that would probably happen over the course of centuries. So, you're not trying to force the land into doing something it does not already wish to do, provided you can supply the energy it needs to do this.

"So, I should just ask nicely?"

Of course not. That would be ridiculous. You ask nicely, give as much Wood Qi as you have into the area you are interested in, and probably add in a nice blast of warmth - via your helpful sword - to really get the juices flowing. Then, when it is all good and loosened up, shape it into what you want: preferably a reasonably sharp incline that a professional army can use to keep an onrushing foe at arm's length.

I took a deep breath, refreshed every bit of Qi by draining one of my smaller mana stones, took an Epic-tier Elixir of Wellness for luck and popped back to the battlefield.

First things first, I knelt down and placed the palms of my hands in the wet mud, reaching downwards in the earth, ignoring the rocks and dead vegetable matter I'd been trying to yank upwards. This time, instead, I found a bunch of root networks that seemed open to the suggestion of rapid and unrestrained growth. The idea was to go for some sizeable displacement upwards, which would lift the ring of soldiers straight up and give them Obi-Wan's favoured tactical position.

Next, I injected my Wood Qi. There's a chance I was a bit heavy-handed with it. I'm the girl who sees two teaspoons of garlic in the recipe and gets out the ladle.

Goodness me, my dear. Are we aiming for a hill or a new mountain range?

Under pressure from my Wood Qi, the roots I had identified swelled to twenty times their original size. God knows what trees they were attached to, but those motherfuckers had suddenly developed some hench foundations.

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I felt the ground beneath my feet begin to shake and tried to calm the whole thing down. I was planning on smooth, gentle growth that would leave Artur's spears still standing, not lying flat on their backs.

Little bit of heat now. No, not too much. Just give the roots something to grow towards.

"You heard him, Drynwyn. Just a touch, though. We're literally dead if you scorch earth this field."

Your lack of fucking faith disturbs me, and the sword let out a soft, billowing heat that swam out over the plain.

The roots reacted immediately. Already swollen to a ridiculous degree, they now used all of that stored-up energy to grow towards the heat source, pushing dirt and rock upwards as they came.

Initially, this was all gravy. Through my connection to the source of their rapid growth, I could direct what was going on. It was not unlike an organic game of Tetris whereby I slotted in different growths to create the edifice we needed to make it through this engagement alive.

Slowly, we began to rise in the air. Various spears from each of the gathered armies cried out in alarm as they felt the push on their feet, but I was glad to see no one was dumped on their arse.

But it was taking everything I had to keep this as steady as possible. I caught Arthur's eye, and he nodded appreciatively at me.

I fucking hated that a little ball of pride flipped in my stomach. So, I was a poodle now, was I? I was just happy for a pat on the head? This flare of irritation caused a momentary lapse of concentration, which made us jerk upwards a bit too quickly, so I had to damp down on my emotions.

We were on a growing mound already six feet in the air, and the goblins were still not quite in javelin range. If they were surprised to see their target on a hill blowing up like a balloon, it didn't seem to cause them to pause. I wondered what the Hobgoblin was making of my success at geographical engineering.

We were ten feet up and looking down the sort of steep incline that would make a skier orgasm when Merlin started to fuss.

Cut off the heat now, my dear. It's all getting a little out of hand.

Drynwyn stopped as soon as Merlin spoke, but the roots did not take the hint, contriving to reach upwards. I was now at that stage of Tetris where you're just flinging blocks around in gay abandon, hoping something sticks.

"Big M! Ideas?!" I yelled, pushing down with everything I had, trying to keep the roots now seeking to break free from the bulging earth beneath the ground.

There was the most extended silence I have ever experienced, and then the wizard finally spoke.

Okay. Here's what we're going to do. In a not-unexpected turn of events, you've taken a subtle and intricate bit of cultivation and jumped on it with both feet. Far too much pressure is developing beneath our feet, so we will need to let it out or risk a cataclysmic explosion.

"Dude, if I let these roots burst from the ground, we're going to be seeing the sort of uncontrolled eruption that occurs when an incel finally tricks a girl with low, low standards into bed."

Thank you for that image, my dear. I would, in answer, direct your attention to thousands of goblins closing on our position and suggest that said eruption in their lives would be pretty detrimental to their goal of killing and eating us.

Sweat pouring from my face, I looked around at the goblins swarming up and around the base of my newly created hillock. It was what I was confident the American military would describe as a 'target-rich environment'.

I pressed down as hard as I could on the roots seeking to pop out under the feet of those on the hill, simultaneously releasing any control on the roots elsewhere around me.

To describe what happened next, I'm going to need to rely on the medium of YouTube. I need you to recall a video that I am sure you have seen. We're in a massive splash park, and a little kid is sitting on a giant inflatable in the middle of a pool. Their massive, cheeseburger-munching parent is at the top of a water slide. As the video progresses, they throw their lard-filled body down the slide, careening downwards with all the grace and elegance of a falling meteorite. They reach the end of the slide and are propelled upwards, dropping to fall onto the inflatable.

Tiny little kid is then catapulted into the stratosphere. Much hilarity ensues.

The roots that exploded from the crowd amongst the charging goblins sent the little green things reaching for the sky like they were moonbound. Likewise, the level of impaling mayhem that took place would have made the Shriket's day.

In moments, the area around our hill had transformed into a Vlad-the-Impaler's-nightmare of thick, gore-encrusted roots that thrust to the sky like angry fingers. Some of the roots had four or five of the things spiked through.

"Fucking hell," Lancelot whispered from my side. "Piss you off, I would not like."

It seemed the wrong time to tell him that this little slaughter was basically a hotfix on top of a fucked-up plan. Especially as the rest of the spearmen were staring at me with a look of terrified awe.

I could see how Merlin might have got addicted to this feeling.

I'd moved the earth to save their lives and then obliterated a large section of an attacking army. Even I was pretty impressed with myself.

But then the drums restarted, the Hobgoblin shrieked orders, and the remaining goblins were climbing the newly-established hill to where our spears awaited them.

This is not over yet, my dear.