Through a forest with almost bare ground apart from a layer of browned leaves, the swarm of red, fleshy monsters running through the gaps of trees formed a seemingly impenetrable wall. It was hardly a number to be concerned over though, merely a hundred or so steel tiers.

What stood out was not their existence as chimaeras, but rather their uniform appearances. Every last one of them was the same size, bounding through the forest with the legs and body of hounds but with faces which opened in quarters to reveal sets of teeth to shred prey down to size.

None of these monsters had eyes, ears, or noses… They just ran with the pack, controlled by simple orders.

Furthermore, not too far behind, a similar group could be seen running also as a pack. And if one travelled north and south, they’d see repeated sights, groups of the skinned chimaeras running in groups with some slight stagger between them. Like a massive arc of the monsters, they all travelled inwards to a point.

Their fanned out movements coagulated after days of travel, and so approached the calamity.

* * *

“Something’s approaching, a lot of them. Still a few kilometres out, but we don’t have much time.” The group stood within the inactive arrays, and Jaren spoke up about what he vaguely saw.

Just half a minute later, Rebecca too returned in a slight huff, and she gave a far clearer image of what she saw, “Hundreds of them. Steel tier, I think. They’re weird though, all their bodies look like normal dogs and are identical.” She only made the observation due to all other chimaera having few similarities.

After all, one cannot be too picky over body parts when making these things, so why care about a ‘perfectly’ symmetric army?

Furthermore, even those of the same species differed in size, gait, and specific skeletal structures.

How many humans have exactly the same face?

Still, Rebecca caught sight of merely hundreds… If they’re really steel tiers, then Icy expected thousands of them to be coming across several waves. Tough to handle in a surprise, but actually rather easy with an array producing Degeneration effects.

Now that they were all present, he activated the barrier array and allowed the dome of yellow light to cover them. However, as the barrier stabilised, this yellow light dimmed to simply produce a soft glow around them, unnecessary during daytime. Jaren found his eyesight almost double in effectiveness, but this mattered less as the trees ahead blocked everyone but Icy’s vision.

“I see them… Thousands of those dogs. Why are they identical though?” Icy read quite a few books on chimaerism over the last few weeks to better understand how those monsters are created and kept together, but the research proved a bust.

In the first place, this is really just a more ‘extravagant’ form of necromancy, and so the method for killing these things is no different from killing any zombie… The problem is that chimaerism took the focus of enhancing the soul as a medium for a stronger body and directly skipped to using strong bodies.

A nuance that most really never really understood, but the difference is immense.

Regardless, at creation, the bodies are fully autonomous, much like any living or undead being. Obviously, dark magic like Necrosis and Degeneration worked well, disregarding special cases, but no exceptional methods for killing undead exist.

Soul magic only has one weakness and, humorously, that’s stronger soul magic.

Icy learnt Severing Blade for that reason around 6 months ago, just in case he ever came to need it.

With their barrier stabilised, and everyone cautious as the packs of skinned canine chimaera quickly grouped up not too far ahead, they couldn’t be sure why the massive spread of them was aiming for a spot about half a kilometre away and not charging straight for them…

“Icy, is it possible to make a chimaera from slimes or ‘merging’ beings?” Mala posed a question, but she didn’t actually need an answer anymore. With their eyesight and the barrier, the gathering of flesh so nearby descended.

The storm which spent a week of refuge within Icy suddenly vanished, the indescribable weight simply gone. The steel tiers in the distance only gestured to them entering the storm’s eye.

No waiting remained, mana poured out of the dragon towards the rain clouds above.

…

In the near distance, everyone saw how hundreds of skinless chimaeras jumped onto one another, and simply laid in place, crushed by the weight of hundreds more piling on further and further. By now, those at the bottom had every limb crushed with their flesh no more than mush, yet they did not care. The tissue, blood, and wetness merged together with one another as though clay mushed together. No longer were there piles of flesh, but merely a singular pile.

It throbbed and quivered, like how corpses may move reflexively, but this was so much worse.

As the pile exceeded three thousand, anyone nearby would hear it. An audible beat, one which made the land shake and throb. This was no heart, such a thing worthless to the monster. The clump of flesh beat simply because it was alive. The immense accumulation pulsated much like a muscle clenched. And so the merger continued, the beat only grew louder as the pile too amassed more flesh.

Halfway through, the seven could not help but wonder if this chimaera even took on the shape of a living creature, or if it’d been designed to simply become a fleshy mountain. That answer came as the remaining dogs, the last of a grand 10,000 chimaeras, jumped into the beating mountain and were crushed by the force of life.

Its body morphed once more, the mountain splitting into four sections which revealed four paws. The living flesh climbed up the paws like poles, creating thin, stick-like legs to start off but developing them with time as the body and head grew. But unlike the miniatures with strange quadrant heads that opened up like a flower bud, this giant form simply showed the head of a dog with its usual snout, eyes, and ears. Well, usual in all but one way…

The thing was a fucking 200 metre long chimaera.

“He turned that into one of them? Where do you even start?” Jaren had no problem accepting reality but struggled to find the logistics of it all.

How did that wizard turn a whole behemoth into a chimaera?

Everyone couldn’t help but wonder the exact same things, but it was Icy, currently swallowing finely ground plants, who received the least leeway. He said, in between mouthfuls, “Quiet and get ready. Mala, release it when you think it’s vulnerable.”

She immediately released mana into the Comet Blast array as endless mana poured from Icy. The sheer volume of toxins he consumed was enough to make even a dragon wary, but he continued without fear. He only got one shot with this, and so far, the clouds above only sparkled with blue lightning showing hints of yellow. Yellow lightning stood no chance against this behemoth, and even orange meant nothing here.

Mana alone was not enough, and he descended his Mind palace, the image of a blizzard-swept mountain appeared above them all, but in comparison to the beast which towered above them, it was like comparing an anthill to an elephant.

Icy saw flicks of white disappear from his soul’s surface and disperse, but the power clearly rose up into the sky. Just as the already dark clouds switched to lightning of pure yellow, he saw them rapidly grow in size. Clouds from nearby felt an attraction to his storm and drew towards them.

This… Was nowhere near enough.

But the skinned chimaera finished its re-emergence. With a single step, they felt the ground beneath them shake. They saw how a single paw crushed a ten-metre-or-so tall tree with ease, and they saw its black eyes focus on their itty, bitty dome.

Several arrows suddenly flew through the air towards its right eye, and the monster didn’t even bat an eye as they all struck. Barely had the tip pierced through by the end of their flight, and all the arrows vanished from its eye. The wound healed merely a second later, and it immediately focused sight on Jaren.

The arrows which appeared at the quiver on his waist gave away the identity soon enough.

It began to move, or rather, it began to bend its back legs.

“Mala, are you ready?” Korridan asked calmly, but the panic in his eyes could not be hidden.

They knew how to win this, a behemoth allowed for that possibility. But that made it no less difficult, just expected. “She better be, or we’re all so fu–” Jaren’s comment received a disapproving stare from Rebecca, and he kept quiet. The useless narration only distracted the two who’d prepare the initial blows.

The lightning above turned orange, the sudden flash of light easily drew their attention, but their opponent seemed blind to it. After a few seconds spent moving its gigantic body into place, it aimed itself properly.

And leapt.

A storm of dust and debris rose up behind it, and the beast rose up high, now directly above them and making use of its frightening body to crush the enemy’s barrier in one swoop. Simple orders: Kill them all and bring back the girl.

It began to fall, the arcs of orange lightning above with black clouds only deepened its appearance of a god-sent monster to annihilate foes.

The array runes flying about Mala constantly repositioned themselves. In all manner of directions of orientations and positions, they couldn’t help but grow concerned as hundreds of the unreadable characters moved into new homes. But as they began to stay still, and then dimmed, Mala couldn’t help but say, “I thought it’d go lower.”

A single stream of mana escaped her finger at the same time.

Instantly, it appeared.

The overwhelming comet of blue and white, a luminance so great that they all winced, partially blinded by the sudden change. It required no time to accelerate, instantly rapidly flying towards the falling monster, already travelling at twice its speed, the two almost celestial objects collided mid-air…

And for but a moment, there was silence. Pure, and inexplicable silence.

Not too far above, the faint comet could barely be seen over the vivid explosion of blue which spread outwards parallel to the surface, forming a growing ring of mana which continued outwards, but the more important eruption of mana like a geyser pierced right through the behemoth.

And as the two forces cancelled out for just a split second, the two intermingled bodies floated, stationary, in the air. The growing geyser of light complemented the expanding ring and fading trail… But that beauty came to an end.

The still was over.

A shockwave swept over the forest, shaking every tree and vibrating the barrier’s surface as it passed through with great intensity. But within, only the sound of Mala’s sigh could be heard, one of relief as she adjusted the aim in time.

The previously descending chimaera flipped around in mid-air, unable to reorient itself, but also found itself pushed backwards. While not much distance, the mere 60 metres of leeway meant that its head and front paws no longer threatened their barrier, and it fell to the ground in a fashion even less graceful than its appearance.

Besides the bounds of missing flesh all over its chest and legs, a massive hole penetrating right through its head could be seen. Comet Blast, already one of the stronger Adept true spells, only left this sort of wound on the monster…

“Two minutes to recharge… How is it already getting up?” Rebecca could hardly believe that its gigantic body smashed into the ground from almost half a kilometre up, and yet the only damage had come from the Comet Blast itself. That fell in line with the group’s expectations, unfortunately, and they saw how the orange lightning above only started to reveal its red tips.

About a third of the ground plants remained… And then Icy had the potions and concentrated fluid. His appearance didn’t seem great either, as everyone saw his own mana gravely fluctuating. A dragon heart which quivered like his could not be healthy either, yet he continued to consume and release.

“Stop releasing soul power you idiot! Are you trying to kill yourself?” No longer distracted by the array, Mala quickly saw through Icy’s deteriorating condition.

Lacking the focus to put on an act, he just continued releasing whatever possible at a constant stream. But as they all stood with a look of apprehension, he said, “We’ll be dead anyway if this storm is too small, can you immobilise it before it recovers?”

Rebecca and Korridan acted immediately, realising that the behemoth righting itself was only a rescinding of their greatest chance.

Raccelline frowned for a moment as Icy clearly struggled to breathe normally at this point, yet she had no choice but to move too, leaving Mala to coordinate the arrays to the best of her ability and try to doctor Icy a bit.

Darak tried to throw some healing spells on which corrected the starving heart and body, but nothing could be done about lacking soul power. Not until he became a Blossoming priest at least, the recovery of the soul required an annoying amount of divinity.

While rarely mentioned, soul power was simply the outer white coating of a soul. It not only provided basic protection, but acted as an immense power source for highly specialised soul magic. And while most people go on to train and create a Formed soul to use the power freely… Icy couldn’t do that for obvious reasons.

His only protection was his soul power. And as he repeatedly dipped down to 5% MP while rapidly ejecting it into the devouring storm above… Needless to say that two bads don’t make a right in reality.

Darak could do no more and moved to heal the four fighting in melee range, everyone’s support spells remained active and every little cut on the two metre thick legs allowed for just a little bit more Degeneration to take hold.

Only against a behemoth could they do this. Only something so slow and unfeeling to small pricks of pain…

But as it righted itself in front of them, the two great eyes looked down on Icy’s barrier as he released mana.

Their end seemed so near.