Every second that passed, the same number of beasts materialized from the forest's shadows. Strings of saliva, steaming from the intense heat of their maws, barely touched the ground before evaporating into the still air. Fearsome, a presence so immense that, if their size didn't bring a fully grown man to their knees, then their appearance alone would convince him that there, at that moment, his life was forfeit.

"Young Delarks, I'm certain this goes without saying, but I will anyway. Flee with the carriage!" Yorn bellowed over the collective dirge of the hounds, "Ah... only one year left... retirement seems so close, yet impossible..." He sighed under his breath.

Before Zane or Milina could respond, the sage drove his stave into the ground. His lips parted and closed, but nothing came from them as he chanted, eyes shut tight in a trance-like state. When his mouth closed for the last time, one of the beasts was already on top of him, its teeth closing around his aged neck.

"Chronus Lock!"

The Delarks watched the rapid series of events that followed in complete astonishment. As soon as Yorn finished his spell, his eyes snapped open, and the offending beast's flaming body halted in midair. Additionally, the spell seemed to affect a large number of the other advancing wolves, stopping them dead several dozens of paces away.

"Well? Are you going to let an old fossil burn to these devils, eh?"

A blur with Nix's face passed by him, "They won't singe a single gray hair on your head!"

Blood erupted from Yorn's quarry, its head fell to the ground, cleanly severed.

The sage raised his gaze up to the branches above, "Young lass up in the trees, clear a way, if you would."

Leaves rustled, and arrows whizzed out from above in rapid succession, felling some that managed to avoid Yorn's spell. It also cleared a path through to the carriage.

"Snap to it, Delark! It won't stay open forever!"

Awestruck, and weak in the knees from shock, Zane snapped to his senses at Yorn's sharp command.

"R-right. I'll need time to harness the team!"

"We'll give it. Just hurry!"

The young merchant nearly tripped over his own feet in his haste toward the reptilians tethered to a small patch of trees near the carriage. He exhaled a pent-up breath, relieved to see no harm came to them. Milina, who he had led by the wrist, struggled to keep Telsi quiet, as to not startle the beasts of burden anymore than they already were.

"Whoah, easy, easy!"

They were, reasonably so, alarmed by the situation. Rearing on their hind legs, they pulled their tethers dangerously taut, scaly tails whipping about instinctively to defend themselves. Unfortunately, that didn't help the hapless merchant in the slightest.

"Milina, take Telsi and hide in the carriage! I'll be with you as soon as I can!"

She nodded, and wordlessly ran toward the carriage, shutting herself inside.

While Zane struggled to calm the reptiles down, the battle between the adventurers and wolves heightened in intensity.

"The spell's weakening! Finish them quickly!"

Arrows hailed down on the immobilized beasts, while flashes of metal and streams of blood glistened in the light of the wolves' immolation. It was a frantic race against time, however, the adventurers' success was not fated to be.

"There's not enough time!" Nix yelled.

Sure enough, the spell's effect wore off only moments after. Frenzied by the stench of fresh blood, they barreled toward Yorn, who stood at the epicenter of the fray, vulnerable to an all-out assault from multiple sides.

"I won't go down so easily, wretched mutts!"

Once more, he began to chant. Shards of ice crystallized around his outstretched hand.

"Friguic javelins!"

He directed the blast squarely at a cluster of oncoming wolves. Some hit their marks, embedding themselves into skulls, eyes, and limbs, while others shattered against the ground, leaving behind icy caltrops to hinder the progress of those behind. For those who managed to emerge unscathed from the deadly barrage, it only seemed to cause further aggravation.

"Hmph, stubborn bastards, aren't you?"

The distance between them quickly closed. Two of the frontrunners pounced onto the old sage, latching onto both of his arms, the force of their impact knocking him to the ground.

"Yorn!" Nix cried while engaged with a dozen of his own.

"Forget about me! Ensure the Delarks' safety!"

"But..."

"Don't underestimate me, youngster! I'm far from finished!"

In a split second, arrows protruded from the wolves menacing Nix.

"Falliva, keep the old man covered while I.."

His words snagged against the newly formed lump in his throat.

"It's... so hot!"

The trees charred, fresh buds shriveled, and the grass underneath their feet wilted. Smoke whirled about in the sudden cyclone generated by the heatwave, ejecting the ashes high into the night sky. At that moment, time stood still. Zane, wrestling with the lizards' reins, looked back at the battle, as did Vijik, who turned toward the bloody scene, still in the cart. All eyes came to rest on one focus.

Despair.

If one were to describe the feeling of pure terror, it would probably involve an increase in heart rate, respiration, and a paradoxical urge to flee with no escape. But for the Delarks and their escorts, terror wasn't exclusive to these things. Instead, the manifestation of the fear they barely managed to swallow earlier for their own sakes, arose as an inferno before their eyes.

One. Two. Three. Four. The heads thrashed in chaotic harmony high above the now-barren forest, wreathed in halos of sanguine flame.

"RUN!"

Yorn's unusually panicked order echoed in the silence proceeding the behemoth's arrival.

As though petrified by the monster's sudden appearance, the lizards froze in place. Zane dragged on them as hard as he could, driven by the monstrosity behind him. In seconds, the beasts were harnessed, and he threw himself atop the pilot's seat of the carriage, reins in hand.

"Hiyaah!"

The carriage careened along the forest path. Zane could see little of it, darkened by the night of a new moon, he wasn't blessed with the gift of light. He could only pray the path would be clear ahead...

A rush of wind, followed by an upending of the world around him made Zane realize that it wasn't. Maybe it was the lurching sensation in his stomach that filled his thoughts with Milina, and little Telsi, or the rapidly approaching howls. As his body arced through the air, he turned his head, desperate to catch a glimpse of the carriage in the darkness. He saw it.

The carriage danced perilously for a split second, having ramped onto two of its wheels from a fallen tree across the path, before overturning with a loud crash. The lizards had fled, their harnesses snapped from their immense strength and the carriage's abrupt collision.

No...

His hands reached out for the ruined carriage as he fell. A dim light in the distance grew brighter and brighter, the howls strengthening, growing in number.

No... please...

As he landed on his back, he could barely see through the undergrowth, Milina's head slowly emerging from the wreckage.

Not like this...

For a fleeting moment, a frantic, inaudible scream.

In his final seconds of consciousness, Zane saw pawprints, blazing a trail of destruction in the direction of the carriage.

"Milina...!"