Eryk’s eyes bugged out in surprise. Trevor was to his left, spear at ready while Drekt stood to his right, cleaver in a two fisted grip.

“Strike!” Drekt’s shout broke the half second of surprise.

Micah staggered backwards, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth as he mouthed the words to regeneration. All of his combat spells were gone along with his wounds. The only reminders from his recent battle were mental fatigue and his low mana reserves.

Drekt’s cleaver slammed into the scepter. Even with the ritual circle weakening Eryk and all of the magically enhanced weight added to Drekt’s weapon, it was the big warrior that stumbled backward, off-balance.

But that moment bought the rest of the team the time they needed. Trevor’s spear flashed out, slipping under Soliborne’s hairline and lifting the ring of silver metal free just as an arrow slammed into a plate of green fire above the Pontiff’s chest.

The arrow slowed visibly, whatever dark enchantment the third prince had provided, robbing it of moment even as the mana in the disintegration arrow pulsed and ate away at Eryk’s defenses.

Trevor rotated, the tip of his spear tracing an arc through the air before he launched Dakkora’s crown down the hallway. It plinked against the floor some sixty paces away, skittering along the marble until it hit the far wall where the passage began to curve in on itself.

“No!” Soliborne screamed, whipping his head around to track the tiara and losing sight of Leeka’s arrow. Without his focus, the plate of green fire faded in intensity, shattering as more mana pulsed from the arrow.

The length of dark metal buried itself in the Pontiff’s side, punching through the young man’s white robe and sinking deep into his flesh. He staggered forward, injured by the attack, and ran into a hemisphere of blue energy that sunk crackling tendrils of blue energy into Eryk, preventing only him from leaving and sapping his strength.

“Again!” Drekt shouted, stepping into the ritual circle with Eryk as he swung his cleaver in a low sweep at the man’s knees.

Trevor thrust high, one of his martial art abilities speeding his spear even as Leeka’s follow-up arrow whistled through the air toward the Pontiff’s torso. Eryk snarled, bringing his mace down to block Drekt’s attack even as he used his left hand to punch the larger warrior in the chest.

Micah crushed a flawed ruby, letting mana flow into his body as he consumed the reservoir stored inside the gem, wincing as the punch dented Drekt’s breastplate and sent the big man flying across the entryway.

Leeka’s arrow hit a plate of green flames that consumed the unenchanted projectile immediately, but her attack had never been the blow that they had intended to land. Instead, Trevor’s spear, sheathed in a rippling aura of wind, drew blood. Another shield of green fire slowed the thrust, but not enough to stop Trevor entirely.

Eryk staggered to the side, staring incredulously at the line of blood on his arm where the spear had slashed open his left bicep. He dragged his gaze up to Trevor, bellowing in rage as green flames flickered deep in his eyes.

In that moment, when the entirety of the Pontiff’s being was focused on Trevor, Micah slipped back into the ritual circle, grabbing the young man by the wrist and jamming his engraving knife into the back of the hand holding the scepter.

Ice cold green flames snapped into being, and almost immediately Micah felt the scrimshaw around his neck heat up. Distantly, unintelligible voices gibbered and screamed. Tendrils of mist, only visible in Micahs’ peripheral vision coiled around him reaching up to almost lovingly stroke his head and face.

Micah poured mana into the engraving knife, activating its enchantments and creating a white hot needle of air magic that sprang forth from the tip of the knife, through the Pontiff’s protective barrier and punching a hole clean through the back of the man’s hand.

Eryk screamed in pain, and Micahs’ muscles bunched, pushing the dagger through the fading fire until its hilt was sticking out of the back of the other man’s hand. In his agony-addled madness, Soliborne dropped the scepter, using his free hand to rip the engraving knife free.

Micah snatched the scepter from the air, turning and throwing it with all of his might down the hallway. Then he jumped away from Eryk, not needing power of foresight to know what would come next.

“Phase B!” Micah screamed, running away from the ritual circle and snagging his spear en route to the hall or iridescent shadows.

Drekt was on his feet struggling after him with help from Trevor. If Leeka was smart, she was under cover, or on a different floor entirely.

The temperature in the hallway dropped noticeably as wings of green flame sprang from Eryk’s back. The right wing scythed sideways, striking the crackling blue barrier of the circle with the sound of a mallet striking a bell.

Micah’s heart stuttered as his Arcana skill felt the force of that attack as it burned through almost half of the sacrifices powering the ritual circle, a year off of everyone’s respective life, in one blow. Blue streamers of energy lashed out, burning lines in Eryk’s white robes and searing flesh underneath as a portion of his attack was reflected back on him, but the enraged man hardly seemed to notice.

His second attack shattered the circle entirely, briefly illuminating the entire hallway with a flash of brilliant blue. Then his wings unfurled, jagged lengths of flickering emerald light that highlighted his ripped flesh and torn clothing as they stretched almost three paces in each direction.

“I will have your skull for a chamberpot!” Eryk screamed, rage and something deeper, more malevolent, distorting his voice.

The Pontiff sprinted toward them. The first window ignited, catching Soliborne by surprise. Before he could process the fact that the Tower’s defenses were being turned against him, the crouching and bestial shape leapt toward him, landing on the young man’s back between the his wings.

Eryk screamed as its green claws dug deep into his flesh. His defenses activated, creating a cocoon of flames that wrapped themselves around him as the Pontiff was brought to his knees by the light monster’s weight.

The purple light outside the stained glass window doubled in intensity. Somehow the shadowy monster plaguing their opponent became more solid, more real. It opened its jaws in a wordless scream of triumph before biting down into Eryk’s shoulder with a mouth full of needle-like fangs.

Flames obscured the injured man as the creature feasted voraciously on his back and neck so none of them could see his face, but everyone present heard his wordless scream.

Then Eryk’s wings exploded outwards, flinging the silhouette from him and into a nearby wall with enough force to shatter stone. Any ordinary creature would be dead or crippled by the injury, but more power just pulsed from deep underneath their feat, healing it instantly and reinvigorating the monster.

The fire surrounding Soliborne disappeared. He staggered sideways, slapping his left hand onto the ragged flesh of his neck and shoulder. Almost immediately, it was soaked in gore up to the wrist as blood flowed freely from the gaping wound.

He looked up at Micah before his eyes flickered to the four stained glass windows between them. For the first time, there was a tremble in his step and fear rather than fire in the depths of his gaze.

The bestial silhouette pounced on him again, somehow passing through a green wing that Eryk brought up to ward it off. It landed on his left side, bearing him to the ground as claws and fangs ignored his defensive flames, tearing great ribbons from the screaming man’s flesh.

The fire surrounding Eryk exploded, sending the iridescent shadow flying with a blast of concussive force. The Pontiff staggered to his feet.

With a clatter, the disintegration arrow fell free from his chest, leaving a cavity the size of three or four fists filled with nothing but dust. Eryk didn’t even turn to look back at them, instead staggering toward the limit of the lit rectangle as he broke into a stumbling half-run toward the stairs.

Micah looked to Drekt and Trevor, nodding once before he broke into a run after Soliborne. Blood and ash streaked the formerly pristine marble as the Pontiff pulled himself toward the exit. The shadow flipped itself to its feet, breaking into a four legged gallop that tore long lines of marble from the Tower’s floor as it sought to catch up with the fleeing man.

Skidding to a stop next to the biggest puddle of Eryk’s gore, Micah set himself, grabbing his spear with two hands before shouting.

“Time Leash”

A gleaming silhouette of a man in the fetal position appeared at Micah’s feet before sprouting a whip of dull silver energy that crackled outward, wrapping itself around Eryk’s neck and jerking him back into the lit rectangle before depositing him, prone, just in front of Micah.

With a grunt, Micah stabbed downward. His airblade split Soliborne’s burning armor, opening the way for the spearhead itself to punch deep into the man’s chest and into the marble below. He invested the mana to activate vacuum, doubting that the enchantment would be necessary, but unwilling to spare any effort where the Pontiff was concerned.

Then Micah jumped backward, leaving Eryk to claw helplessly at the spear pinning him to the floor. Blood bubbled up out of the young man’s mouth like water from an overfilling spring.

He made eye contact with Micah, his gaze dim and unfocused.

“It’s not possible,” he whispered. “I beat you. I remember it, but-” Vacuum activated, removing Eryk’s upper lungs and his ability to speak.

Then the iridescent shadow pounced, ripping the defenseless body asunder as it shredded unprotected and feasted on the dying man. Micah pulled his spear from the corpse a second before it burst into a pyre of green flames, but the shadow didn’t even seem to notice him, instead focusing all of its attention turning one of the most powerful men in the world into little more than a discoloration marring the marble floor.

Micah walked back to where Micah and Drekt stood, some forty paces away. Trevor held the silver crown in one hand and the scepter in his other, spear tucked in the crook of his arm. Drekt just stared at the silently snarling shadow as it devoured what remained of Soliborne’s corpse, ignoring the massive green fire that burned around his dismembered body.

Drekt shook his head as Micah approached, dragging his gaze from the grisly sight to watch his arrival. The big warrior smiled weakly.

“Your plan worked Micah,” the big warrior remarked blandly. “I’m not sure whether Ankros would be annoyed at its cowardice, or applaud the tenacity and planning that made our victory possible.”

“Cowardice?” Micah asked with a snort. “I wouldn’t call my sprint through the hallway cowardice, and even if my spell erased the first battle from existence, that doesn’t mean that I don’t remember it. The deluded asshole broke all of my ribs and punctured a lung and he wasn’t trying his hardest. If we fought him at full power, he would have wiped the floor with us.”

“Well it’s a shame Eryk turned out to be the bad guy,” Trevor said with an easy shrug. “Anyway, your prizes await, brave champion. I proudly present to thee a little silver circle of unfathomable power and a metal stick of cosmic disaster.”

Trevor handed Micah the crown and the scepter. After everything they’d gone through, it felt almost anticlimactic. There was no flash of light and peal of bells. No prophecy or portent that signaled the momentous occasion. Simply the handover of a pair of slightly shiny magical tools.

Even having tasted the artifacts' immense strength, they felt too light in Micah’s hands. As if they were a pauper’s reward after the immense struggle to make it to the tower and defeat the Pontiff. It was almost like they cheapened Garrat’s death and the titanic battle against Soliborne by just glittering dully, inert.

“Come on Micah,’ Drekt said, waking him from his brief reverie with a gentle slap on the back. “It’s time to head down to the library and retrieve the girls. You left them to sort through the books for anything you might find worth copying a couple of hours ago, and I’m sure they’re going crazy waiting to hear back from us.”

“One thing first,” Micah replied. “There are some more of Dakkora’s artifacts in the vault. Nothing as powerful as the crown and the scepter, but we should be able to find a use for everything stored there. We should clean it out before we head down to the fifth floor and-”

“Wait,” Micah cut himself off, frowning. “Trevor, you said that ‘it was a shame that Eryk turned out to be the bad guy.’ Did you actually know him before today?”

“Of course,” Trevor responded. “I played dice with Soliborne and a couple of the other sailors pretty much every night on the Leel. Nice guy even if he had a bit of a chip on his shoulder. I was surprised to see him on the Amelia, but he was acting really weird there. Every time I brought up starting a dice game he would glare at me. I just figured the captain had a thing about gambling and didn’t push the issue.”

“Of course,” Micah chuckled, lapsing into full on laughter as he tried to choke out his words. “Of course you knew him from gambling Trevor. I don’t know why I would have expected anything else.”