Though taken our hand was forced early, we all know generally what to do. The white color of the Deepwood Moss sticks out easily, even in the low light conditions, and I quickly make my way there. Acid rains down around me, littering the impromptu battlefield with blistering pockets of destruction and making navigation even more difficult with the already crippling area denial from the spider traps.

The relative inaccuracy of any given shot from the beetles is entirely compensated for by sheer volume of output. A quick glance at the tree reveals that a veritable legion of the things are crawling around, taking a shot before adjusting and shooting again. Even with my greatly boosted Intelligence, it’s nearly impossible to track all the projectiles and navigate them. Fortunately, I have Energy to give me boosts of speed to avoid seemingly lethal situations. Cerberus doesn’t even bother, instead charging directly towards our goal without any regard for the acid that seems to slide right off his fur.

Lauren’s diminished presence influences the monsters to target the rest of us more than her, so she makes it to the patch of moss first and starts cutting into it. Making a mental note to avoid breathing when I get near, I use my shield to smash through an impassable torrent of acid. The bulk of it gets deflected harmlessly to the ground, but the force from being redirected also splatters a fine mist of the stuff onto my arm.

Immediately, my arm lights up with a thousand pinpricks of pain, but as my mind sinks ever deeper into familiar River’s Flow battle trance I quickly put the distraction out of my mind in favor of continued survival. Time begins to blur, passing slightly slower every second as any color left in the world bleeds out to leave only shades of gray.

I move with perfectly timed motions and immaculate balance, navigating without stutter and without wasting a single step. My Energy comes into better focus, allowing me finer control over how much I use and making my sudden bursts of speed just as efficient as my unaugmented movements.

A line of spider traps lies in front of me, with my approach coinciding with another onslaught of raining acid, but I’m supremely confident I can clear it. The pre-battle fear and apprehension I felt melted away the moment River’s Flow activated, and although I know it’s a crutch, I don’t care about relying on it in a situation as dangerous as this.

With one last powerful step, I ignite the ideal amount of Energy to jump the traps and launch into the air… without nearly enough strength. It was like I tried to start a lighter, but instead of a flame, only a handful of sparks came to my aid. I don’t understand. My mind falters in confusion, and time starts to accelerate forward again, effectively preventing any chance that I can recover.

A second ticks by, entirely wasted, while I realize that my Energy wasn’t even close to empty, and it was nothing I did that caused the ignition to fail, it was the same thing that gave my that unprecedented control over my Energy. Moron! I know I always have less control of my Energy when I use River’s Flow! Why didn’t I think it was strange for that to just flip?!

As if in confirmation, the familiar, mirthless laughter that can only belong to Insanity echoes through my mind.

I forcibly banish the distractions from my mind. The web I’m headed right for, that I have less than a second to avoid, has a strange rune on it that I don’t recognize… and that’s the last thought I have before touching the web and exploding into light. I lose control of my body too fast to scream in pain from being brutally blinded. Pain lances through my body, but in my blindness and general sensory overload, I can’t make out what is happening. I seize uncontrollably, continued bright flashes keeping my vision from recovering to any degree. Something clamps down on me and wrenches me rapidly away from where I was, a threat which I immediately mobilize my Energy to attack only to stop at the last second when I realize I already have an Energy connection with this creature.

Moments after Cerberus clamps down on my incapacitated body, the spasms come to an abrupt end. I blink rapidly, whipping my Energy into a torrent of healing, accelerating my recovery as much as possible.

My eyes come back, the pinpricks of acid burns vanish, and the immense nerve damage only takes a little longer to erase.

“I’m good!” I shout to him, trying to be heard over the din of other runes being activated and the deceptively loud splattering of acid. It’s only by a hair that I react fast enough to land somewhat well when he simply opens his mouth and lets me tumble out.

Having realized we had just arrived at the moss patch anyway, I roll to my feet and grab the satchel full of vials I brought for this purpose. Despite my attempts at using leaves to cushion them, many of the vials were broken over the course of my journey. I hurriedly find and grab three intact vials, but the moment of being stationary allows the rapidly tiring beetles a perfect shot.

I look up in time to see a blanket of acid hurtling towards me, and I know instantly there’s no escape. I will the shield on my arm to expand as much as possible, but there’s no time, and it was already almost as large as I could get it. My body tenses as I bring the shield up to block what I know won’t be enough. Thankfully, I see Lauren was only on the edge and is in the process of dodging out of the affected area. Thetzeke still hasn’t made it here, and Cerberus is… glowing?

A sound like a ghastly howl emanates from my Carnine companion before the air itself shatters under the strain of a colossal bolt of lightning which erupts from his mouth. The bolt impacts the center of the wall of acid, instantly vaporizing almost all of it. A distant explosion echoes around the space, with the ultimate impact site being wreathed in blue and orange light. Cerberus breathes heavily, large amounts of blood dripping down from his mouth. He turns to me, snapping me out of my stupor. “Go!”

I fly into action, harvesting a ton of the moss and filling all the bottles as well as my satchel for good measure. The hallucinogen be damned, if it hasn’t affected me yet, I’ll live with the consequences later. Thetzeke arrives, easily catching the twin packs Lauren and I throw to him before taking off back to the relative safety at the edge of this mossy clearing.

The defenders, having thoroughly exhausted their ranged offense, emerge to drive us off in close combat. Shadows in flowing cloaks of dead plant matter ride atop beetles and spiders alike, seeming to guide the insectoid charge towards us.

The three of us spare no time in deciding there’s no way we’re taking down hundreds of these things and attempt to retreat as fast as possible. Lauren rapidly leaves Cerberus and me behind using her exceptional speed and acrobatics, but a quick survey of the enemy indicates we should still make it to the forest without much issue. The denizens of the dungeon are unlikely to chase much further than that… I hope.

Just as it looks like this fuckshow might turn out alright, Cerberus runs out of steam. Whether it was from saving me, shrugging off all that acid, or that blast of lightning that was far more powerful than anything I’ve seen from him before, he suddenly slows to little more than a walk.

I slam my foot into the ground, digging a furrow in the mundane moss to pivot and run back to him.”Leave me! Go!” But his words only drive me harder to reach him. When Cerberus lets pain into his voice, that’s a time to be afraid, and I refuse to let him die for something like this.

He releases a ragged growl when I don’t answer, coming to a stop and turning to face the thunderous tide of foes. “There are… worse ways I have died.” He starts to glow again, clearly intent on going out in a storm of lightning and destruction… a desire which will have to go unfulfilled.

“You think you’re getting out of our deal by dying?! Hell no! You owe it to me to tear all this down, and that doesn’t mean dying here!” He ignores me up until the moment I land on his back and the mounting glow of another lightning charge sputters and dies. “Run! I’ll keep them off you!”

A moment's hesitation is all he gives before turning his back on the enemy. They’re almost on top of us, ready to overrun our pathetically slow retreat in a few seconds at most. I have no illusions about trying to fight them. It would be heroic, daring, and arguably dashing, but we would both die. The key difference between heroics and foolish confidence comes from whether you live to tell about it. I just needed to make sure Cerberus was headed in the right direction for what comes next…

I can only hope the heinous god that watches over me enjoys my suffering too much to let it end with death. Saying a quiet prayer to the sick bastard, I slam my hand into Cerberus’ back, igniting Energy as I force it into him.

The effect is instantaneous. My Energy pool diminishes immediately to half, stabilizing at losing around a tenth per second, and Cerberus almost kills us both by tripping when he suddenly launches forward. Fortunately, he’s not the leader of the Carnines for nothing and quickly adapts to his newfound strength and speed. We streak across the remainder of the clearing, leaving the enemy army in the dust. Euphoria suffuses my mind as I realize we’re actually going to make it, which only stops when my vision starts to fade around the edges and I realize my Energy bar is empty. My grip around Cerberus’ neck slips and I can’t stop myself from sliding off his back. In a tangle of limbs and pain, I impact the ground several times due to the sheer momentum I was carrying before coming to a hard stop against a tree.

My body starts to scream in protest, but it’s too late. The Energy deprivation is already overpowering all else in terms of sheer agony.