“NO!” I watched Leresa crumple to the floor, but that was a quick lived action. My world instantly became enveloped in blinding light, and the giant bellowed once more, shattering my eardrums for a second time that night.

After the light had subsided, I was dazed, and it took me a good minute to regain my bearings. Unfortunately, that was time that I didn’t necessarily have.

I knew it was only a matter of time before the giant’s core started attacking again, so I quickly scrambled to my feet and ran towards Maria.

The tentacle that connected her to the giant had been obliterated, along with a good chunk of her left side.

However, that didn’t stop her from preparing for battle once more. She assumed a fighting stance, surprising since it was the first time this whole fight she had done so.

Speculations could be left for later though, and I had a job to finish. I continued to run at her, even as she fired a photon bolt. I grit my teeth, and sliced through it with Dantae.

‘Leo, snap out of it! We can use our photons again!’ Hazeel screamed in my head. My eyes widened as I started to teleport towards Maria at high speed.

Whatever attack Leresa and Rexir had pulled off had given us a fighting chance, and I wasn’t about to waste it.

Rocketing forward, I attempted to skewer Maria’s body with Dantae, but the core simply swatted the blade away. I used the redirected momentum by opening a portal in front of me, and continued it into a slice.

She roared, and smacked the blade away once more, before rebutting with a short-range laser. It caught me off guard, but either Hazeel or Vanessa had seen it coming, and opened a portal in front of me.

The portal opened back up behind the core, and by some superhuman reaction time, Maria managed to miss having her chest pierced, instead sacrificing her right arm to do so.

Sensing that it was losing, the being stomped on the giant’s skull, and a dome of hardened flesh came up around it.

I tried using Hazeel to cut it, but not even the wood elf’s superior sharpness and durability could cut through to Maria.

“Damn!” I shouted, although I couldn’t hear myself. Oh well, if it was trapped in there, then I would just know what to look for when it came out.

Vanessa, Hazeel, keep an eye on it. I want to know when it looks like it’s going to emerge.

‘Roger.’

‘Ok.’

The two concluded, leaving me to run back and check up on Leresa. Rexir was done for. I knew it as soon as I saw his blade shatter. The possibility of being able to bring him back was there, thanks to the holy blacksmith, but we’d need to get all his pieces, a feat I wasn’t sure we could accomplish after the giant was felled.

With those thoughts in my head, I ran to assess the damage to Leresa, but… I felt it again. The darkness coming to take over my heart, my mind, my rationale.

The only thing brewing in my mind was pure hatred as I looked into the Silver Princess’ lifeless eyes.

Hatred for Christian Armando, hatred for Alison Walker, and hatred for myself, who had dragged both of them into this mess through obligation and friendship.

“Rgh… Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” There was so much anger running through me that I did the only thing I could think of: I closed off my mental connection to Hazeel and Vanessa.

I didn’t want my emotions to poison them, the way it was poisoning me. I looked back in hatred at the cocoon, sitting on top of the giant’s head like a pimple.

I used some of my powers to send both the corpse of Leresa, and the hilt of Rexir’s shattered blade back down to the white house.

I bit the inside of my cheek, and then turned and ran as the taste of blood filled my mouth. My mind was empty.

It remained that way even as I jumped off of the giant, and started to fall downward towards Earth. I sneered as more rotwings flew up from the giant’s legs to try and intercept me.

I guess that they were autonomous once they left the main body. My hands tightened around my two blades, and I drove them through the flock.

I became covered in photons, and dragged them down with me, killing more rotwings as I fell faster and faster with each passing heartbeat.

Finally, the ground was in sight. I willed the photons into Hazeel and Vanessa, giving them a forceful boost in power.

If we were still alive after this, I’d apologize to them. For now, I needed everything I could get.

Their blades shone brightly, Hazeel’s was a silver light, while Vanessa glowed in a brilliant azure. The mist seemed to disperse around me as I fell, being absorbed by Hazeel and Vanessa as we streaked by.

I held my blades out in front of me, and did the one thing I had been trained to do my whole life: I opened a portal in front of me.

I slid into the familiar darkness of the photons, and opened the other end of the portal a ways above the giant’s head.

I came out in the sky, and continued to absorb more and more of the fog as I blazed towards the skull of the dimension eater.

It seemed to sense that something was wrong, as it released even more rotwings. That only served to anger me, and I thoroughly eliminated anything standing between me, and finally being able to finish this fight.

In a last ditch effort, the giant raised another layer of skin around Maria, but that wouldn’t save it from my wrath.

I slammed through the giant’s head, breaking the sound barrier and rupturing Maria in the process.

I didn’t know if the creature made any death throes, but for the sake of my sanity, I’d like to think it did.

I sent myself through various portals to stop my momentum, and finally came to a crash landing in the Capitol Reflective Pool.

It was then, looking up at the disintegrating monster, that I finally lost consciousness.