I climbed.
The cavern wall rose like a broken spine, slick with mineral sweat and old scorch marks. I dug my fingers in and pulled. Stone cracked. Pebbles rattled past my face. My boots scraped and failed and scraped again.
I climbed.
Every grip threatened to give. Every foothold sang with stress. The wall shuddered under my weight, split under my hands, spat dust into my eyes. Once my grip failed entirely and I swung free, heart slamming, legs kicking at air until I caught a seam by instinct alone.
I breathed. Once. Twice. Three times.
I climbed.
The wall narrowed. The stone grew brittle. A chunk tore free in my hand and I fell a body length before gripping onto the wall again. Pain flared. My shoulder screamed. I bit it down and climbed anyway.
Above me the wall thinned into darkness. Not close,not far, either. A final stretch that was just shy of the length of the wall of Redgate.
I reached the last ledge.
I jumped.
Lightning tore from me.
The sound chased me upward as my body cleared the wall in a violent surge. I gripped the stone, pulled myself up, and came up on one knee.
I counted my breaths. One to slow the shaking. One to quiet the ringing. One to steady my hands.
Blood slicked my hair and ran down my face. I wiped it away with the back of my wrist and tasted copper.
The forest waited ahead.
I called my helm into being. I felt it lock around my skull with a familiar weight. I summoned my spear next.
I stood.
I ran.
Branches whipped past me. Roots tried to claim my ankles. The ground dipped and rose and split beneath my feet. I did not slow. I did not look back. People were hurt. I could not afford to.
_______________________________________________
(THIRD PERSON POV)
The leap carried her straight into hell.
Ophelia hit the bull-head first.
Her greatsword came down in a full-bodied arc, Prana screaming as it poured through her arms. The blade bit deep into horn and bone. The impact detonated through her shoulders and spine, rattling teeth, blurring vision. The bull-head bellowed, staggering, but it did not fall.
It swung backhanded.
The blow caught her midair and hurled her through two trees. Bark exploded. Wood cracked. She hit the ground hard enough to carve a trench through roots and soil. White-gold armor screeched. Pain flared bright and sharp. Her vision tunneled.
She rolled before the follow-up stomp could crush her.
The ground caved where she had been. Dirt and stone geysered upward. The shockwave knocked Adam off his feet, Tani hanged onto him. Victoria skidded, boots digging furrows through mud. Melina screamed as she barely kept her footing. Victor kept steady. Nita was also knocked of her feet.
Ophelia pushed to her feet.
Blood ran from her mouth. She wiped it away with the back of her gauntlet.
The bull-head charged again. The clay golem followed. Its torso split and reformed. Arms multiplied. Fingers fused into blunt, crushing fists.
The golem laughed.
"LOOK...AT...YOU!!" It mocked, voice layered and wrong. "SO...SMALL..."
The fists came all at once.
They filled the air. They blotted out light. A barrage meant to pulp bone and will alike.
Ophelia raised her sword and met the first wave.
Impact after impact smashed into her guard. Her greatsword rang like a bell struck too hard. Each blow jarred her shoulders. Cracked ribs screamed. Armor buckled. She slid backward through mud and roots, boots carving trenches as she fought to stay upright.
Gold flickered weakly around her.
The fists kept coming.
She dug her boots in. Forced herself upright. Took the next impact straight on.
Her feet skidded. Her knees bent. Her sword flew father away. She stopped.
She straightened slowly.
Blood dripped from her chin.
She grinned.
Memories flashed without warning. Sunlight on stone courtyards. The ache of training too long. Her drill instructor's voice telling her restraint mattered more than strength. The first time Prana had burned her from the inside out. The fear of losing herself to it.
She hated Prana.
Especially this.
"Nasty pieces of shit. All of you monsters are," Ophelia said quietly.
Her aura changed.
The gold stopped flickering. It tightened. Condensed. Drew inward like breath before a scream. Then it erupted around her hands, wrapping her fists in dense, blazing gauntlets of light. Wisps of Prana curled off them like heat haze given shape.
More light poured out.
Arms formed behind her. Not flesh. Not illusion. Warrior limbs of pure Prana, layered and overlapping, fists clenched, elbows cocked, ready to strike.
The clay golem's laughter faltered.
Ophelia stepped forward.
She punched.
The air detonated.
Her fist met the first wave of clay hands and annihilated them. Not shattered. Erased. The Prana arms followed, a storm answering a storm. Hundreds of blows landed in heartbeats. Each punch carried weight and intent and fury.
The golem reeled. Its torso deformed under the barrage, caving inward, limbs flying apart, reforming too slowly to matter.
"GREEGHH!!"
The bull-head lunged.
Ophelia turned and caught it by the horns.
The impact drove her heels into the ground. Roots snapped. The creature screamed, not out of pain, out of rage and annoyance. Perhaps, fear, if could feel it.
The Prana gauntlets flared.
She tore.
Bone screamed louder than the beast. Both horns snapped free in her hands. The bull-head staggered back, shrieking, blood spraying across bark and stone.
She turned and cut the clay golem's head straight of its shoulders.
The clay golem tried to reform its head. Tried.
Ophelia hurled the horns like blades.
They spun end over end, golden light screaming along their edges. One embedded deep. The other cleaved clean through. The golem's head came away in a spray of mud and stone and fell apart midair.
Its body froze.
Then it started to reattach.
Ophelia exhaled hard. Her aura flickered again. The extra arms faded, leaving only the gauntlets burning around her fists. Her shoulders sagged. Her breath came ragged.
The monsters shifted tactics.
They turned away from her.
Scourge-tainted wings beat hard. Kobolds swarmed. Naga surged through undergrowth. The surviving bulk of the clay golem lunged toward Victor and Nita.
"RAGHH!!!"
The hornless bull-head, still alive, barreled for Adam and Melina in blind fury.
The forest filled with screams.
Adam barely blocked a charging kobold before another took his legs out from under him. Melina stumbled as a shockwave knocked her sideways. Victoria fought like a machine, but even she was being pushed back step by step.
Ophelia spun.
"No! No, no, no!!"
She tried to move.
Her legs buckled.
The sight burned into her. Friends bleeding. Screaming. Overwhelmed. The monsters tearing into them with renewed cruelty.
And then—
The forest screamed differently.
A sound like thunder ripping sideways through the trees. Lightning split the canopy. Branches exploded. A white-blue blur tore through the battlefield with impossible speed.
Something arrived. Someone. Like a guardian spirit.