[You know I hate to pester you, but…] Purple light drew Lindon’s attention to Reigan Shen again.
This time, the Monarch was coming in with a two-handed sword that ran with blood. He was doing something with the Phoenix’s madra, perhaps feeding it to the blade to strengthen it, but Lindon was trying to dodge a technique that bent Fate. He had bigger enemies.
A slash came in from Reigan Shen, a sweep of madra that erupted at the same time as an attack from the Wandering Titan, and Lindon had to waste extra madra and burn some of his limited soulfire to deal with both.
Lindon’s patience slipped.
Dross, find me an opening.
[Here. But you know, this is going to shave an hour or two off our maximum time.]
Lindon didn’t care. Getting rid of Reigan Shen was another goal he could accomplish. That would improve the world, even if Lindon wasn’t around to see it.
Dross helped Lindon identify the pinpoint timing. He deflected a falling sword of the Phoenix at just the right moment to cause it to slam into the whipping tail of the Titan.
The two attacks clashed, sending black cracks spidering through space and churning the ocean beneath, which created a split-second pause in the battle.
Lindon shot toward Reigan Shen.
The Monarch defended with his two-handed sword of blood, but Lindon destroyed the artifact with one Empty Palm from his left hand. His right hand shot for Shen.
Reigan Shen’s defensive constructs activated and forced Lindon back for a moment, but Lindon had already used up the time he’d allotted for himself. He switched to his Blackflame core, activated the Burning Cloak, and slammed a fist down on Shen’s skull.
Bone cracked.
Reigan Shen blasted down through the water and into the stone beneath, but Lindon wasn’t finished. He followed up with a two-handed blast of Blackflame, thicker than his torso, with all the soulfire and authority he could cram into it.
That should put even a Monarch out of the fight.
In case it didn’t, Lindon used Wavedancer to deflect a Striker technique from the Wandering Titan. A shining golden razor of earth madra hit the flying sword and was redirected.
Right toward Reigan Shen.
Lindon dashed back into the battle, shoving the Dreadgods east once again. He knew the Rosegold continent was coming up, but he was boxed in. There were populations north and south of here, and the longest stretch of uninhabited ground was between east and west. Once he reached the coast of Rosegold, he’d try to turn the fight around.
Though there was only so much he could do.
He was back into the fight, shoving a river of blood-red flame into the sky using the Hollow Domain, when he sensed a change in the world.
[Uh-oh. Hey, I know you don’t want me to keep drawing your attention to Reigan Shen, but I still think you ought to look behind you.]
Lindon was struggling with the weight of an ocean of burning blood, but he still glanced back.
Reigan Shen had returned to his original form.
A white-and-gold lion leaped out of the ocean, and a roaring image in the sky met him. The Lion Icon.
In his natural body, Shen was regal and imposing. A vast white-gold mane that shimmered in the sunlight, a pale pelt with bright highlights. He radiated majesty and strength.
The effect was only heightened by his wounds. One of his eyes and the entire side of his face was blackened and burned away, one of his legs had been half-crushed, and scorch marks marred his hide.
Sacred beasts tended to take human bodies because the form resonated with madra more easily, allowing more complex control of techniques. For this, they sacrificed power.
It may have been the temporary support of his Icon, but Reigan Shen at the moment felt like a Dreadgod himself. He had given up his weapons, weakened his Path.
In return, he gained strength.
He kicked off of nothing and vanished, leaping through space.
Lindon’s spiritual sense screamed a warning and he met Reigan Shen’s pounce with a Soul Cloak-powered punch.
Of course, at the same time, he had to hold off the Titan with nine flying swords and burn a cloud of red poison from the Phoenix.
Dross was just as busy, on an invisible front. The white halo over Lindon’s head flared as Dross sent mental attacks against all three, a flood of dream aura at a scale that temporarily matched the Silent King itself.
With Dross distracted, Lindon didn’t know exactly how much time he had left. But he knew he was burning through it too fast.
If he had to, he would burn himself down to nothing.
The Void Icon approved.
Yerin never thought she had underestimated the Monarchs. They were the kings and queens of the world, able to go toe-to-toe with the Dreadgods under the right circumstances.
But maybe she had underestimated Malice.
A dozen blades of shadow the size of towers fell from the sky. They flew over the forests at the eastern end of the Ashwind continent, where the dragons had once ruled. Yerin slashed at one of the Forged swords herself, intending to break the one in her way and continue on to Malice.
It wasn’t easy. Yerin had to pour her whole effort into her attack, and only managed to break through the shadow sword with a full-powered technique. Orthos, Little Blue, and Mercy struggled to defeat a sword each, though Ziel and Charity seemed all right.
Even a technique with one-twelfth of Malice’s will was enough to match any one of them. And the Monarch was drawing back the string of her bow.
To relieve pressure, Yerin used the Endless Sword.
The blades of shadow echoed with sword aura and cracked, helping the others to break them, but Malice’s next attack was focused with deadly intent.
On Little Blue.
An arrow tore through space, but Yerin appeared before it in a blink of white light. She deflected the first, but the second was right behind it. Mercy took care of that one, stopping it with her armor. Orthos burned another out of the air, and Ziel blocked two. The last, Blue had to handle herself.
All the arrows came at virtually the same time.
While they were still reeling, an armored Malice appeared next to Orthos. She was human-sized, and he punched at her with the Burning Cloak active, but she absorbed the blow easily and hit him in the chin, ribs, and gut in quick succession.
The air exploded with the force and Orthos blasted into the distance.
Striker techniques from Mercy and Yerin ripped through the space Malice had just occupied, but she was already gone.
Once again, she was on top of Little Blue. She brought her bow down on Blue in a two-handed strike. Blue blocked it with crossed arms, but Malice caught her before she could fly into the earth and stabbed another blade of shadow into Little Blue’s gut.
Blue defended herself with a brief eruption of the Hollow Domain, then Ziel and Mercy forced Malice away, but Yerin could see what was happening.
So could Dross.
[She’s identified the weak link,] Dross observed. [Not that I’m calling Little Blue weak, of course. Just weaker than, uh, she needs to be for this fight.]
Yerin saw that herself. Orthos and Blue might be at the same level, but Orthos had centuries more experience. No matter how many memories Little Blue had absorbed from other spirits, she wasn’t living up to her potential yet.
Well, it was Blue’s role to learn from this fight. If she survived, she would grow.
It was Yerin’s role to make sure they all survived.
Yerin had held herself back to take the stance she needed for the Reaper’s Sword. Now, the Phoenix Song sang through her.
She had no trouble building killer intent for this attack. Malice was an easy target to hate.
The world flashed black and white as Yerin swung her sword.
Malice spun around so fast that Yerin didn’t see it, and there was an arrow already nocked to her bow. The Netherworld Empress flashed behind her, and the image of a bow appeared in the sky. The Bow Icon.