The elder did not retreat.
He twisted his wrist.
A ribbon of darkened space coiled around his staff and spun outward into a barrier.
CRACK. CRACK. CRACK.
Three enormous forelegs slammed into it from three different angles, and still the old man held.
The blows should have pulverized a fortress.
Instead, the air quivered like stretched metal. The distorted space absorbed the force, bending but refusing to break.
The ants screeched, their vibrating cries shaking the fractured ice below.
The elder's eyes glowed faintly as Ghost and the remaining ants charged again.
"Five against one," he murmured. "Rude."
He lifted his staff a fraction.
BOOM.
Mana erupted outward, an invisible shockwave that distorted the light itself.
All five ants were blasted back in curved arcs, their massive bodies dragging ripples through the frozen air.
But they recovered instantly.
Ghost was the first back on him.
