Surrounded by the dying cries of beasts, Kaius’s pillars started to flare.

  Every minute of their battle was more chaotic than the last. It was only by dint of their overwhelming strength, the speed of their flight, and the mindless aggression of their opponents that they survived.

  If they were a little weaker, a little slower, they would have been overrun in moments. If the Tyrant’s army had any semblance of coordination, they would have been outmanevered.

  For all their advantages, they still struggled. Since Ophelia’s last trip, the Pegleg had been hammered. Slick with the gore of the fallen, its hull was dented — even torn in places, when they’d been too slow to slay beasts with armour-penetrating abilities. Kaius was astonished that all eight of the landyacht’s spider-like limbs still functioned. Bloody hells, two of them sparked with every step.

  It was, perhaps, the single most frustrating battle of Kaius’s life. None of them were suited for a protracted battle on open ground like this. They couldn’t even use their speed!

  Yet a dozen souls relied on them — shielded by the dubious security of their vessel.

  That pressure, that responsibility, weighed heavily. It was a pressure that hammered in time with his heart, sinking deep into his very soul. A new kind, one he wasn’t used to.

  He was no stranger to the risk of death, but it was something he had always faced personally. A looming spectre he could fight off with faith in his own capabilities, and trust in the strength of his companions. He knew what was too much — when they should flee, regroup, or fight to the bitter end.

  This? A ceaseless battle against an army? Every instinct screamed that the best they could hope for was the grinding defeat of attrition. They should use their superior speed to flee for the walls of Deadacre, where fortifications and allies would balance the scales.

  He only had to sign away the lives of twelve innocents if he wanted to do that.

  So he fought on, and essence flowed within him.

  The energy boiled, absorbed by his pillars haphazardly without the direction of cycling.

  His Aspects may as well have been an iron fortress for how little they changed. Kaius could feel the bottleneck of the first stage of refinement like never before. He was so close — but there was no time to sit down and force the transition. Not in the middle of a battle.

  Kaius saw a flash out of the corner of his eye — a beast, dead behind the Pegleg. Some kind of giant, scaled rodent, its natural armour gleamed like burnished brass. Mana was coalescing in its claws — yet another Skill.

  Heat flushed through his veins; Kaius kicked off as a Shunt exploded behind him. Ianmus was right in the beast’s sights, and he wasn’t going to take any chances.

  A secondary detonation halted his advance, and Kaius touched down at the rear of the vessel. The rodent swiped — fingerlength claws raking a path through the air, a gleaming trail of energy hanging behind them for a bare moment.

  Three carving arcs of energy shot straight for him. Kaius narrowed his eyes, lashing out with his blade in a rising parry. The beast’s skill might have been ephemeral in nature, but A Father’s Gift cared not one whit.

  His sword cut the energy blades like they were solid, shattering the ability mid-flight. Shards of remnant metal-attuned mana crashed against his scalemail — leaving a sting like he had been slapped.

  Kaius moved on, darting to his left where a beetle the size of his torso was clambering over the edge of the deck. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw an arrow pulp the rodent utterly.

  Diving into a lunge, Kaius thrust through the beetle's head. Sparks erupted from its shell — racing up his blade. He grunted roughly, muscles in his arms seizing. The beetle’s retributive strike proved its undoing when Kaius’s spasm caused him to rip his blade sideways. The creature’s carapace ripped open with a crack, ichor spilling in a wave.

  **Ding! You have slain Brassy Glintshell - Level 108 Steelback! Experience Gained! Reduced Experience for slaying a foe of significantly lower level!**

  Continuing his nonstop movement, Kaius felt the familiar heat of essence through his bond. Porkchop’s aspects were flaring as well, incensed by his own war on the ground beneath the hull of their landyacht.

  It didn’t take long for that same welling of power to surge within Ianmus and Kenva. It was visible thanks to Truesight — a tiny mote of unmistakable strength that ebbed and flowed within the depths of their core.

  It might have been miniscule at their current stage of the path, but there was no mistaking essence. It had a tangibility, and a visceral potency that mana lacked.

  “The other’s too?” Porkchop asked, feeling what he had noticed through their bond.

  “Yeah,” Kaius replied, even as he fired off one of his precious Nails at a lithe beast that leapt for Kenva’s back with its horn leveled.

  “At least these mindless weaklings are good for something.”

  Kaius grinned, as his heart pounded in time with the flow of essence within him. He did have to admit that it felt good to cut loose a little. Nothing quite hammered in how much he had grown like slaughtering Iron and Steel beasts by the dozen. Barely more than a year ago just one of these creatures would have proven a life or death battle.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  Hell, two years ago even finding one would have been a notable occurrence in the Frontier. Beasts used to be rare in previously low-mana zones, let alone ones of this strength.

  He just wished that they weren’t the only things separating their charges from certain death.

  Risking a glance towards the east, Kaius focused his Truesight. His eyes widened as he just barely made out the familiar grey stone of Deadacre’s walls peaking over the horizon.

  “I see Deadacre!” he called, redoubling his efforts as the sight of their goal soothed some of the burn in his limbs.

  They were close! Ophelia would be returning soon, and they would be able to make their final dash to the city alone and unburdened.

  Ianmus and Kenva both smiled, buoyed by the news.

  “Thank the gods! My head is pounding.” Ianmus replied, simultaneously casting a ray from his hand as another bolt of solar magic erupted from his keyseal.

  No wonder the mage had a headache, he’d been channeling without break since they’d first reached the fleeing villagers over an hour ago. No doubt the mana restoration tonics he’d been quaffing whenever he got the opportunity hadn’t helped things.

  Falling into a rhythm, Kaius flowed through the battle — wrecking havoc against any beast that dared try for his backline. It was a hypnotic dance, no individual beast strong enough to push him to the point of madness — even if the constant crush forced him to a pace where he had no time to think.

  In that state of instinctive motion, his essence began to move with an intention it had previously lacked. Drifting along to the tempo of his pounding heart and heaving breaths, it’s aimless drifting through his aspects halted. Guided by unconscious desires, it moved from pillar to pillar — shakily, and unsteadily, but cycling nonetheless.

  The second Kaius noticed what was happening, he jolted — and the rhythm was lost. The mote within his sole went back to bobbing haphazardly, infusing his pillars only when it brushed up against them by random chance.

  His heart rate picked up. No! He couldn’t let this opportunity slip through his fingers.

  Xenanra had mentioned that cycling was possible in battle, but this was the first he’d experienced it. Even if it hadn’t been intentional, and had lacked almost all of the velocity and control he could manage during quiet contemplation, it was a start.

  Focusing his will, Kaius urged his essence to cycle — only for his concentration to break as he narrowly slipped around a thorny vine that erupted from the ground below him.

  Gritting his teeth, he abandoned his previous tactic. Force wouldn’t work here — it was too dangerous to split his focus. No, he had to find that state of flow again.

  Wholeheartedly devoting himself to battle, he found that meditative state in a torrent of blood.

  His essence shuddered as he grinned maniacally, his cycling threatening to collapse yet again as excitement surged within him.

  Kaius forced himself to breathe. Battle and breath, that’s all there was to it.

  Bit by bit, his cycling accelerated as more and more essence pressed into his aspects. They grew denser, harder, until Kaius could feel them quaking from the pressure they held within.

  Just a little bit more!

  A unified scream erupted from the throats of a thousand beasts.

  Kaius jolted, losing the moment.

  As one, the Tyrant’s army surged.

  Once absent of all semblance of coordination, they struck as a single unit. A coordinated assault.

  Beneath him, he caught sight of the front line charging — racing for Porkchop. Behind them, more than a dozen beasts leapt at once, scrambling for the deck.

  Kaius’s eyes widened. He reached for Stormlash. Thunder split the air as smoking corpses fell to the ground.

  More took their place.

  “What the fuck is happening!” Kenva cried as she fired a Shattering Rain to eviscerate three beasts that simultaneously leapt for her.

  Kaius grit his teeth, cursing the awkward weight of his prosthetic as he charged along the deck, cutting through beast after beast.

  “I don’t know! I started to unconsciously cycle, and I think I was about to break through to the first stage of refinement — they just suddenly went berserk!”

  Ianmus snapped off another shot, before he raced back three steps to avoid a beast — Starlit Alacrity leaving a glowing trail across the deck.

  “As if we weren’t having enough trouble already! Ro mentioned that the Tyrant said something about essence…but over such distance?”

  Kaius hissed; he couldn’t wait to plant his blade in that bastard creature’s belly. Why in all that was holy had the system decided to make it so volatile to essence! It was one thing to hunt them, but to send an army after Deadacre?

  How was that fair! Rotten roots, after what it had done to Bronwyn and his team he would have set out to hunt it immediately — this siege would only delay their confrontation.

  “Ophelia just took off from the wall!” Kenva yelled.

  Pivoting to slip past a lunging wolf, Kaius shouldered the creature over the edge of the Pegleg. Porkchop crushed it with a slamming paw before it could scramble to its feet.

  Risking a glance to his left, Kaius saw a rising speck from the city walls. The sight of it caused a surge of relief — at the speed the storm mage could move, she would arrive quickly.

  Then it would all be over. Their charges would be safe, they could store the Pegleg, and flee to the city walls faster than the beasts could follow.

  That glimmer died as he turned back to the teaming horde trailing behind them. Far in the distance, further than even Deadacre, one of the many massing clouds of aerial beasts split off.

  It was just a fraction — maybe fifty varied insects and birds, but it surged towards them all the same.

  No! Not now, they had to be too far away! Why would the Tyrant’s main forces notice them now! Could it really just be essence? It was so little, barely a mote!

  Yet the flying creatures approached, and Kaius knew it cut off their hopes for an easy rescue. Alone, without appropriate defenders, any mage was vulnerable. To fly, Ophelia had to devote her entire attention to her spell.

  She’d be torn apart, even by beasts half her level.

  Kaius looked back towards Deadacre, and saw what he already knew would happen. Ophelia was descending, back behind the wall.

  They had to get the survivors to safety themselves.