The winds around the beast quickened, contracting into a single point to its side. The sound of breaking glass erupted as a body formed. Anaakendi let out an annoyed roar. To be dismissed by the beast like so much chaff!

  As David occupied the monster, dodging around its strikes and returning mana-infused kicks and punches, the incarnation lifted her arms, commanding the winds forth.

  The air moved, past the trees and boulders, so fast it whistled and whined, ripping up stones, branches, logs, bones.

  The bride of the dusk wind ordered its lover to turn on itself, to fill its cyclonic belly with weapons, more, stronger. Uproot the trees, unearth the boulders.

  More. Stronger!

  A tornado, pregnant with violence, formed behind her. It surged against its restraints, but she held it back.

  Not yet.

  The evolved Fel circled David, probing him still, never committing fully. He gritted his teeth in frustration and dodged another lash from one of its barbed tentacles, batting away the clawed paw that tried to shred him as he did.

  He had thought it wary, but he didn't feel in control. The only thing he could do was play the defiant mouse.

  He glanced to the left and right, saw his allies converging, and allowed himself a smirk.

  Fine, he could be the distraction.

  “LEVIATHAN!” He shouted.

  His mana answered.

  He directed the tsunami to his leg, engorging his newest imbuement, Tremor.

  His foot lifted.

  For the briefest of an instant, it became the centre of the world.

  He unleashed it.

  It impacted the ground.

  The ground sank several meters instantly, the Fel's eyes turning downward, wondering where its footing had gone.

  Then the world pushed back, and violence erupted. Jets of compressed water cut into the beast, ejected boulders mauled its body, whizzing stones pierced it like wet mulch.

  The Fel made its first sound of the fight: a keening wail, as it was launched a hundred metres skyward.

  Anaakendi nearly lost her focus as the earth buckled, her eyes wide as she saw the boy channel an earthquake into the beast.

  But as it flew skyward, she knew it was time.

  She lowered her hands, and the thrashing cyclone flew up, meeting the monster as it reached the apex and began its return to earth.

  Anaakendi squeezed, and the winds compressed into a spear point, aimed skyward.

  The beast's hundred eyes noticed the wind pike, just in time for its point to penetrate its skin.

  It drilled through its body, the flying detritus acting like jagged spinning blades.

  A mess of oily skin and flesh slammed onto the ground, tendrils of smoke escaping the steaming horror.

  Anaakendi looked upon her handiwork and stood tall, satisfied.

  And froze, as the smoke attached itself to the scattered gore like strings, before going taut as it pulled the pieces back together.

  And then David saw it. All along its reforming body, what he had thought to be the metallic sheen of oil. They were patterns that shone in a black light.

  Runic script, as he had seen on the red Fel in the underground preserve.

  The thing was covered in it.

  As the final few rends on its body closed, it swung its head toward Anaakendi, all eyes staring at her. Before she could react, the fel's head flew forward, its neck uncoiling like a snake, and one of its jaws closed upon her body, cracking it into disintegrating shards.

  The impossibly suspended head then turned its attention toward David, while the thing's body, a dozen meters away, rotated to face him.

  It looked... annoyed.

  David swallowed.

  Leandro stood mid-step, gawking at the scene that was unfolding ahead of him.

  He had just witnessed two back-to-back attacks that could have devastated an entire unit of Azure Guards on their own, used on the singular creature.

  A creature which then pieced itself back and continued its uncaring assault upon their numbers.

  Maybe... maybe David had the right idea. This was not something the five of them could defeat. He swallowed, features hardening.

  He could probably buy them time to escape.

  He inhaled to shout, but David's voice reached him first.

  “Leandro! This thing is a Fel, and it's using imbuements! We just need to make it run out of mana!”

  The veteran blinked. A fel?! But... “What if it's like you!?” He shouted back.

  David's reply was quick. “Then we die.”

  Despite himself, he couldn't help but let out a booming laughter.

  “Very well! A grinding fight it is, then!”

  And if the fight did grind out for too long, well, his old bones would buy the young man and his girl time to flee.

  He approached the nearest tree, gripped it with one clawed hand, and ripped it free of its roots.

  He took aim, let his arm rocket forward, launching the tree like a crude javelin.

  Then he wrenched another, and another, and another.

  He bellowed another laugh. This was getting fun!

  As Leandro began pelting the fel with trees, David did his best to block and deflect the beast's attacks. From his right, the barbed tentacles of its head harpooned at him. From his left, clawed paws tried to rend his body.

  Even with his imbuements running at full power, some of the attacks left marks on him. Welts and scratches, which did little except distract, as their accumulated pain mounted.

  He noticed Niala had reached the battle and had begun weaving her mana into trees, one after the other.

  He returned his attention to the fel. He had to keep its attention; Niala wasn't a front-line fighter, she couldn't receive one of the things' attacks.

  He was already getting damaged anyway, why focus on defence...

  Instead of deflecting, he began counter-attacking, plowing Strong Arm punches into the fel's appendages, trusting in his Iron Body to keep the worst of the wounds away.

  The fight devolved into a string of retributive strikes, with the fel's attacks drawing thin lines of blood from David, while he broke the thing's bones and ripped its flesh away in return.

  And then, Niala made her play.

  Niala panted as she squeezed the last drop of her mana into the last tree. Each one had a small throwing phial glued to their bark, the ones with the worst acids and poisons she had ever brewed.

  The memory of perfecting these things still gave her goosebumps.

  But, they had a use. Tonight was the proof. There was no good in a fel, nothing that could be redeemed. It was worse than a rat.

  She locked onto her target and clapped her hands.

  The two dozen trees pulsed with violet energy as they listened to the tale Niala had woven into them.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Their bark opened up, swallowing each of their phial, pushing them deep within their cores.

  Roots snaked out of the frozen ground, lifting the trees up, like a coiled mass of legs, as the trees began bobbing their way toward the fel.

  Their branches bent and crooked, becoming claws that reached out for the dark creature.

  Her army was on the march.

  Between David's vindictive fight and Leandro's sustained barrage, the fel didn't seem to notice, or maybe didn't care about, the advancing trees.

  Even when the first ones reached its flank, it ignored them.

  Even as they began clambering up its limbs, it cared only for David.

  Only when they began slamming branches against the fel's body, shearing them into pointed appendages, and burrowing them into its flesh, did it dedicate a few eyes to observe what was happening.

  But it was too late.

  The tree fibres twisted, creating thin tubes that ran from the tip of the branches and all the way to the phials nestled within them. And then, the trunks squeezed the phials, shattering them, forcing the liquid along the tubes, directly and deep within the fel.

  From within its flesh, God-grade poisons and acids, concoctions that should not have been possible, rampaged, devouring and corroding everything they touched.

  The fel's eyes bulged, and, for the second time, it keened.

  David caught his breath, one arm limp, his clothes torn and wet with blood, watching with grim satisfaction as the fel convulsed and twisted. Its movements were halted, desperate, unable to decide between ripping the trees away or contorting from the engulfing pain.

  Niala reached his side, fishing out a potion from her satchel and handing it to him.

  Without a thought, he consumed its contents. Within seconds, he felt his wounds sizzle closed.

  A second potion gave him a boost of energy, and just like that, he was ready to fight once more.

  But... the fel was melting from the inside out, liquefied flesh sloughing through open sores all over its body.

  He afforded Niala an appraising look. Her ears were erect, tail rigid, except for the swishing tip, as she stared at the creature.

  A small smile drew on his lips. He kept forgetting how scary she could be.

  She noticed his gaze, and her mouth curved upwards as well.

  And then he flushed his body with all the mana he could and pushed her down, jumping in her place, just in time for a pillar of tar-like flesh to crash into him. Tendrils formed on its end, coiling around him, as the pillar curved skyward before driving David back into the ground.

  The impact knocked the breath out of his lungs. He was pulled up and then crushed into the ground again, and again, and again, each strike deepening the David-sized crater.

  The pillar let go of his limp form and slid back into the oozing mass of flesh that had been the Fel.

  Niala was upon him in a second, thrusting another healing potion in his mouth. He had just enough sense to swallow.

  A few agonizing seconds later, he crawled out of the hole, next to a stunned Niala. As he laid his eyes upon the creature, he froze as well.

  The bubbling flesh was roiling, its imbuements flashing haphazardly upon it. Limbs formed, only to melt back into the mass, bubbles erupted, releasing a wail when they popped.

  But slowly, every so slowly, the Fel seemed to be gaining the upper hand, as forms endured for longer, and became larger, as Niala's potions petered out.

  The fel was enduring.

  Niala slumped, her ears lowering, as she turned her face toward David. “What can we do? Even my woven potions weren't enough.”

  What could they do?

  If even Niala's weaving...

  Wait.

  “Niala, can you still weave?”

  She shook her head. “I used up all my mana, and I drank two mana potions to weave the trees. A third one would probably kill me.”

  “What if... You weaved my mana?”

  “Yours?” She asked, ears pointing up. “Can I even do that? Wouldn't it be super dangerous, like, worse than mana poisoning?”

  “I think you can. I think I just need to open my pathways and trust you.”

  “You think? How? Why?”

  “I don't know, I just do.” He grabbed her hand and looked deep within her eyes. “I trust you, Niala. I know you won't hurt me. Here,” He said, calling Leviathan forth to the very edge of his being, right up to where his and Niala's pathways nearly touched.

  And then he nudged it forward, the tiniest of tendril brushing up against her inner self. A buzz of electricity ran up her arm, making her entire body shiver.

  Her eyes widened. She felt... connected. She looked up at David and found nothing but trust and love. She steeled her features. “Ok, let's try this. What kind of weave do you want?”

  “A giant sword.”

  She blinked and then giggled. “Oh, that is so you.”

  Going silent for a second, she then nodded, looking him in the eyes. “Ok, David, a giant fel-slaying sword for my hero.”

  Together, holding hands, they rose.

  David held out a hand, fingers grasping the invisible hilt of a sword, as Niala closed her eyes and felt for the connection between her pathways and David's.

  There, nestled within their hands, a link. A passage. An open ear.

  She began telling her tale.

  The tale of a sword three times the length of a man, with all the mass and force of such an implement, and yet as easy to move as a feather.

  A sword made of pure, unbreakable mana, and a desire to slay evil, to drain and anoint its foul essence.

  Empowered by a spirit noble and caring.

  Born out of love and complete trust.

  The twinning of two desperate souls, finding greater strength within each other than ever possible alone.

  She opened her eyes and locked gaze with David. Her irises glowing violet, his glowing blue.

  Leviathan roared.

  They spoke as one, blessing the sword with a name.

  “Heartsong.”

  There was a moment of silence, the winds dying along with every other movement.

  A brilliant beam of indigo light burst forth from David's outstretched hand in an eruption of swirling blue and violet fire.

  The light expanded, pushing back reality, forcing its existence to become truth, filling out the form of a massive six-metre sword.

  The liquid energy stilled, becoming solid, the wind whistling as it cut itself on its edges.

  In feint blue relief along its length was drawn the image of a sea serpent, jaws ready to bite at the sword's tip, the handle guard shaped like armoured fins.

  A soft glow enveloped the blade, a blue-and-violet aurora.

  Heartsong was ready.

  David let go of Niala's hand and tested his... their weapon with a swing.

  It moved exactly as he wanted, starting and stopping instantly, the blade obeying him and only him, entirely ignoring physics.

  Jordo's voice rang out. “An amazing display, Sir and Madam.” The golem said as he approached from the side.

  David turned to him, then to Niala, then to the half-reformed fel, a few dozen of its eyes staring at the blade. “Jordo, take Niala and retreat. Whatever happens, it's ending now.”

  Niala turned to him. “David, no! I-”

  “I understand, Sir.” Jordo cut her off, marching on her and picking her up, before retreating.

  David looked at her, a smile on his face. “It's ok. You gave me this weapon, now I'm going to use it. You're still fighting with me.”

  “...you better stay safe.” She cautioned him.

  He nodded, then turned his attention back to the beast.

  He took a step forward, and the fleshy mass recoiled.

  No.

  No.

  No.

  No.

  No.

  Stay back.

  No.

  No!

  Don't!

  No!!

  STAY AWAY!!!!!

  STAY AWAAAAAAYYYY!!!

  Before him, the beast forced itself back together, even as the last of Niala's potions ate at its flesh.

  The thing's imbuements were on fire, pushed to their extreme, and beyond. He could smell the sizzling flesh from where he was.

  And yet, it crawled to its legs, stooped its malformed head toward him, and focused its non-bleeding eyes in his direction.

  David swung Heartsong in a horizontal arc, its tip slicing apart the black flesh as if it were water.

  The wound dripped, its edges turning a pallid grey, before crusting and falling like dried mud.

  The Fel wailed and sent all of its head tentacles forth, a mass of spikes bearing down on David.

  The courier held the blade sideways, shielding his body behind the wide blade. Whichever appendage touched it turned to chunky ash.

  David advanced, while the creature backpedalled.

  It renewed its tentacled assault, swiping with a clawed paw at the same time.

  David stabbed at the paw, piercing it, before swinging the sword in an overhead arc, cutting a dozen barbed heads off.

  Grey ash mixed with the snow into mud.

  The Fel's hundred eyes blinked.

  By the time they re-opened, they found David flying at it, sword levelled at its torso, too fast to do anything but throw itself to the side.

  As it did so, and watched the man fly past it, its terrible intelligence decided it was time to flee. The pest would need time to finish its jump, and-

  It saw the man's foot glow blue.

  It saw him kick at the air.

  It heard the air shatter.

  It saw the man suddenly change direction.

  Straight for it, his blade centimetres away from piercing its flesh.

  Its eyes squinted.

  If it could not survive...

  Then they would both die.

  As the sword began piercing its body, erasing away all that it was made of, it willed the rest of its body into thousands of needles, all pointed at the man that was about to end its existence.

  In one final flare of Fel imbuements, it released them with a cracking boom. The first thousand shattered upon its bodily shield.

  As its eyes died one after the other, the last one glared with glee as it saw the shield shatter, and the man's body pierced a hundred times.

  The fel, the purifying sword embedded within its flesh, turned into a statue of white ash, scattering into the winds.

  David, eyes wide, organs shredded, fell into the snow with a wump, breathless. The last thing he saw was a beautiful, panicked catkin screaming and running toward him.

  And then he was gone.