Quinn had to fight the urge to cover his ears as Mona let out a guttural roar right next to him. She was holding a piece of stone almost twice his size above her head, and glittering lines of copper light were pulsing across her body in a slow, steady rhythm. They almost looked carved into her flesh like the channels of a forge, sharp angles and geometric shapes similar to the tattoos on her hands. There was a tangible feeling of overbearing weight in the air around her, as though a mountain itself was squeezing him in its titanic fist. It felt like he could be crushed in an instant if Mona even looked his way, but her glowing eyes were locked onto the skittering horde as she stepped towards the edge. Her rippling aura made the pebbles and stones at their feet shudder and quake with each breath, and Quinn watched in fear and fascination as the Dwarven rune for “WRATH” etched itself onto Mona’s chest.

  “EAT THIS!” Her voice caused the very air to tremble as the boulder fired out of her hands like a ballista bolt, the lines of mana across her body dimming significantly as she unleashed her attack. It flew with terrifying speed, fast enough that it didn’t even get a chance to arc or slow down before it slammed right into the mass of seething rats. It completely crushed the front line and sent a violent tremor through the wall, the cracks spreading for over 30 feet in every direction as dozens of rats were sent spinning through the air. A hail of stone shards pierced right through the first row of rats and lodged into the ones behind, causing grisly injuries that outright killed a handful of the vermin. Strangely, Argus and Lucy were completely unaffected by the display of power, with the shrapnel, vibrations and cracks seeming to avoid them as Mona’s unyielding will shielded them from the fallout. Quinn saw subtle pulses in the mana flow each time a crack or shard grew close to them, causing them to suddenly veer off course, often by only a few inches. The chamber shook as fountains of gore splattered across the wall and dripped down over the rest of the horde, painting them and the waters below red with blood and viscera. Unfortunately, the rats were undeterred by the show of force, only growing more voracious as they continued their march towards slaughter or satiation.

  The rats were unbothered by over 20 percent of their number being crushed, dismembered or dislodged in a single blow, and they didn’t back down or flee, as Mona had hoped. Instead, they adapted with disturbing synchronicity as smaller packs began to break off and snake up the wall, like the tentacles of a dwelling leviathan. Lucy had tried to climb and aim her distracting beam at the same time, but it was too ineffective now that the short-sighted creatures had split up so much, so she focused on reaching the edge instead. Her eyes were clenched shut in concentration, which didn’t slow her down at all as she followed Quinn’s image across the wall. She was burning Stamina at a terrifying speed to keep up with the mental projection, and her calculations showed she would barely make it before she was completely tapped out. Her fingers and palms were covered in shallow cuts and scrapes, a result of her shoving her hands into the many gaps that Quinn had used, but were slightly too small for her human-sized digits to fit comfortably. She didn’t hesitate or flinch, sacrificing her flesh for speed as she grew closer and closer to the edge. With a final burst of effort, Lucy felt a strong hand wrap entirely around her upper arm and pull her onto solid ground. She immediately collapsed and began panting heavily, finally opening her eyes to see Mona peering down at her with a forced smile on her dusty face.

  “Not the time for nappin’ love, your boyfriend is ‘bout to be rat food, and we need all the help we can get right now.” Mona said softly, reaching down and placing her palm on Lucy’s heaving chest. Tendrils of copper light snaked across her body and began pulsing soothingly, her veins seeming to glow with a corresponding pale-blue hue as their mana briefly mixed like oil and water. Despite her brutish appearance, Mona’s mana felt warm and inviting, like a hearth’s fire in the wintery depths of Lucy’s cold and calculating energy flow. She felt her reserves of stamina slowly restore from Mona’s touch, and her hands and feet tingled as the cuts and abrasions she had garnered on her climb closed over in moments. After five seconds, Lucy was topped up enough that she felt she could get to her feet without assistance, so she tapped Mona’s hand as a sign to stop, only for her sign to be ignored as Mona shook her head like a scolding mother. She tapped with a bit more force, but was still held to the floor with frustration evident on her face for another five seconds. Only then did Mona retract her mana and pull her up to her feet, patting her on the head and brushing the dust off her back. Lucy swatted her arm with annoyance, but only received a chuckle in response as they both prepared to help Quinn stem the tide of rats. Lucy looked over at him and was startled, seeing something she had never seen on his face before; there was murder in those usually kind eyes, and his pupils were focused like sharpened daggers, pointed directly at the approaching horde.

  Quinn let out a sharp breath as he whipped his arm forward, a fast jolt of stamina shooting through his pathways to enhance his throwing speed to a painful degree. The stone needle tore from his grip like a crossbow bolt and soared in a perfectly straight line towards his target, piercing right into the upper vertebrae of the snapping rat’s neck on Argus’s heels before it could even react. It jerked for a second, then fell limp as it detached from the wall and tumbled into the waters below. It wouldn’t be long until another came close enough to take a bite out of him, but Quinn was ready. Each time he threw a shard, a rat died before it knew what happened. He was chipping off pieces of his stamina pool like a stone mason with each throw, consuming a small chunk each time to deal maximum penetration for the smallest cost he could manage. This was the fastest he had ever thrown anything before; he usually only spent his stamina to run or climb, and if he had to choose between fight or flee he would choose flee every time. He shuddered internally from the thought of what this technique could do to a person, but those thoughts weren't productive right now. Instead, he put all of his mental efforts into one thing: killing rats.

  A dozen rats were flattened as Mona threw another fist-sized rock, the magnified weight of the projectile causing the air around it to quiver and buckle under the pressure, turning the small stone into a small boulder. Her veins were bulging with each herculean throw, and her mana channels were almost crackling with rage and strain as she burned all that she had to keep the horde at bay. Grabbing another rock, Mona stifled a curse as she activated Weight of the Earth for the 5th time, her pathways feeling raw and charred from the constant use of such a draining skill. Instantly the light rock was so dense she could barely hold it with one hand, and it took the last shreds of her willpower and energy to let it loose. Her final blow was her weakest yet, but still it carried the force of the ancestral mountains within it. It tore through a line of rats like a cannon ball as Mona fell to one knee, the channels across her body winking out as her vision swam. She hoped she had done enough, it needed to be enough.

  Argus had finally reached the peak, and was now in a desperate sideways shuffle towards the ledge. It was getting harder and harder for Quinn to keep them away from him, despite their dwindling numbers. Lucy clenched her hands in fury as she saw oversized teeth bite deep into Argus’s calf before a needle could punch through its eye, blood seeping through his torn breeches and trickling down the rope. She watched in disgust as some of the rats were taking the time to lap up the blood like dogs in the sun, her fury bubbling over as she yanked the light crystal out of her pocket. She tapped Quinn and Mona on the arms to get their attention, pointed at Argus and covered her eyes with one hand. They immediately understood what she wanted, and Quinn called out a quick warning before following his own advice.

  “ARGUS, SHUT YOUR EYES!”

  His words were followed by a blinding red flash that permeated the entire chamber, coming directly from Lucy’s outstretched fingertips, the crystal held between them as she covered her eyes with her other hand. It was so hot and bright that it burned a few layers of skin off of Lucy’s palm and fingers, before crumbling into dozens of ruby-like shards that clinked onto the ground. Lucy looked at her mangled hand in surprise, and then disappointment. She had tried to push the burst outwards with her fine mana control, but the explosion of light-attuned mana was so fast and blistering that she hadn’t even felt it; her flesh had just melted in an instant, like she had tried to catch lightning. She let out a quiet groan as she stumbled backwards, falling into the soothing embrace of Mona as her eyes flickered shut.

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Quinn suppressed a wince as he rubbed his eyes in discomfort. Despite constricting his pupils to the limit and shutting his eyes as tight as he could, he had still been effectively punched in the face by the explosion of light. For a brief instant his vision went from darkness, to bright red, to burning pain, and back to darkness. Cursing his high Perception, he blearily opened his watering eyes to see a blurry field of screeching meat. Despite their poor eye-sight, the creatures were writhing in pain and crashing into each other, disoriented and confused from the blast. It would take them some time to recover, just enough time in fact for a bedraggled Argus to finally reach the edge of the platform. He took one shaky step towards Quinn, only to immediately lose consciousness and fall right on top of him, almost pushing the much smaller man over. Quinn struggled to lift the scalekin and wrap his arm over his shoulder, dragging his bruised and bloody clawed feet behind him as he and Mona moved as fast as their drained bodies could carry them.

  After half a dozen random turns through pipes and tunnels, Lucy woke up. This was followed by Mona clamping her mouth closed to avoid her pained wailing from alerting the rats, or something worse. Quinn could see tears streaming down the human’s face as her charred hand bumped against Mona’s chest, leaving black smudges and blood stains that the dwarf didn’t react to at all. She was slung over the burly woman’s shoulder, looking like a worn-out dish rag that had been used to put out a fire. After what seemed like forever but was only around two minutes, Lucy nudged Mona to let go of her face. She did, albeit warily, only to hear no scream of pain or anguish come out. Instead, she gestured around her with her head, seeming to be asking where they were.

  “From where we were, we took a left turn, another left turn, went right through a four-way crossroad, took another right, and have walked past two turns since then.” Quinn said, leaning closer to avoid his words echoing off of the damp walls. It was a strain to carry Argus and talk at the same time, but he did it anyway. The poor lizard had yet to wake up, and he was so exhausted his long tongue was hanging out of his mouth and over Quinn’s head, leaving his hair and face sticky with his saliva. He had to keep flicking it out of the way in annoyance, something that he had already vowed to get revenge for in the future. At least he’s not the venomous type, he thought to himself with some relief. Some scalekin could produce venom, either from biting with their fangs or from inside their mouths to spit at their prey, but luckily Argus was not among their number. If he was, Quinn would probably be paralyzed, poisoned or suffering from a magical curse by now. Lucky me… he thought to himself, wiping drool from his forehead, again.

  Lucy gestured for them to finally stop, causing a grateful Quinn to slip Argus off of his shoulder and slump against the wall, leaving Argus with his scaled head resting across Quinn’s lap. Mona carefully placed Lucy next to Quinn, let out a low groan and promptly laid on the floor, spreading out her aching limbs before shaking the dust out of her beard. Her hands and arms were twitching painfully, a consequence of overdrawing her mana to hold back the rat tide. After a few quiet minutes where the only sound was tired breathing, the calm was broken by a phlegmy cough from Argus’s parched lips. His large eyes slowly slid open, and the first thing they saw was Quinn’s beaming face.

  “Quit smiling like that or I'll bite you, we're poisonous you know.” he grumbled, before flicking the grinning gnelf's elongated ear with one of his dulled claws. What were once polished, painted, preened and pampered were now cracked and scarred, stripped bare and exposed like the scavenged bones from carrion after his desperate scramble for freedom.

  “You'd be venomous, you dolt, and you're not even that!” Quinn retorted with a poke to the scalekin’s snout. “And even if you were, I'd already be dead from your silver tongue smacking me in the face a few hundred times!” he said, huffing and crossing his arms. The two stared at each other for a tense moment, before they both broke out into wide grins and started laughing in unison.

  “Could you two fall in love quieter, my head hurts from all the gnashing and yelling…” Mona mumbled from the floor, causing Lucy to kick her outstretched arm with her foot, and Quinn and Argus to look at each other with serious, studying expressions.

  “I don't think you're my type.”

  “I'm everyone's type, but I don't think you have what I'm looking for in a mate anyway.”

  “hmm, are you looking for someone maybe… taller?”

  “Of course, I don't want to be forced to kneel anytime I need some affection.”

  “Smarter?”

  “Than you? Not a very high bar, but someone smarter than me would be better, as difficult as that will be.”

  “Freckles?”

  “...possibly, but why-”

  “Maybe someone like Luc-ow!”

  Lucy had been watching their reunion with amusement, only for her freckled cheeks to burn redder with each probing question. She reflexively smacked Quinn on the shoulder for his last remark, only to wince in pain as her burnt hand throbbed as a result. Argus saw her blushing face and their eyes met briefly, before they both looked away awkwardly, only for Argus to see her torched flesh and singed clothes. Lucy saw his fright but immediately started to shake her head and gave him a fatigued thumbs up with her unscathed hand. Argus gave her a weak smile before shooting Quinn a slitted stare.

  “It is cruel to poke at the hearts of others Quinn, it makes one tempted to poke back.” He said, accompanied by a clawed finger jabbing his chest. Quinn just gave him a knowing smile and patted his hand, seeming oblivious or indifferent to the false threat.

  “Sometimes a poke is what one needs to get on the right track, to do things that one doesn’t have the courage to do without a little… pressure.”

  “...What if I apply pressure to your skull instead?”

  “I’m not taking shit from a guy with no shoes.”

  “...well played.”.