Caeden felt his heart unwind. Lily was safe, and here. A moment later, when Erik's face popped up alongside hers, he relaxed even further. They had survived. They had survived. A massive, goofy grin split his face, and he started laughing. "Well, that was a hell of an entrance!" He shouted up at them.

Lily rolled her eyes, grinning back at him. "Sorry we're late. Erik convinced me he would recognize the stone pillar with the building inside it because he'd seen one before, so we were exploring a distant part of this rock formation. We showed up around the time mister dark armor here started fighting. After that, I was waiting for a free moment to get the drop on this guy. What's going on?"

She dropped off the side, a chunk of ice breaking off the baby glacier she had dropped on the killer machine-man and carrying her to the ground. Erik followed suit, stitching himself to the ground and rocketing down. They both landed near the base of the iceberg. Because of that, Caeden caught sight of a dull red glow coming from deep inside the ice.

"We'll catch up after this, but I think that thing is going to bust out soon. Lily, Erik, that's an assassin sent here to kill me. Well, probably me. Anyway, it's some kind of ethertech human hybrid horrorshow. I'm pretty fucked up right now, and it'll take a while to heal. I need you both to stall it as long as possible. It's fast and uses whip-blades and thermal energy blasts." Caeden rapidly caught them up to the current circumstances. "Cat!" He shouted.

"Yeah!" A slightly winded reply came back.

"You good?"

"Yeah, Lily breaking my spell knocked the shit out of me, but I can still kick ass," Cat answered.

"Great, ‘cuz I want you to drown that thing in as many undead as you can manage. Mister…” Caeden turned to look at the Death Knight that had saved him.

"Call me Dave, kiddo. The boss formed a familiar bond with me, so we'll be working together going forward." The knight waved. "Nice to meet you two. I'm sure we can do some better inductions later."

"Right, you and I are going to finish it off. Lily can weaken it using Frost Break. Lil, it doesn't seem to have much flesh, so I'd focus on that over Chillvein." He looked toward his girlfriend.

"Right, you aren't up to speed with us either. My babies got some upgrades." Lily looked toward the top of the iceberg. There was a roar followed by a bird cry, and two giant figures leaped down. One thumped heavily to the ground, burying his feet in the sand, while the other glided on black wings speckled with light. Both dwarfed Caeden in size.

"Shit, Snowball? Sky?" The now truly massive bear snorted in greeting while Sky preened under his awed gaze. "Lil, what have you been feeding them?"

He meant it as a joke, but Lily responded anyway. "Oh, mostly the weird monsters on this continent. Anyway, they're way stronger now. Like, really strong. They can help you and Dave here deal the final hits. Oh, one more thing." She cupped her hands around her mouth and took a deep breath. "ASHERTA!"

One last figure jumped down. It was a young woman about their age wearing pure white robes that had obviously been made by Sauma at some point, though Caeden saw that Erik didn't have his Incarnation out right now. She had brilliant blue hair and piercing yellow eyes with slightly slitted pupils.

"Um, hello." He looked between the newcomer and Lily.

"Ash doesn't talk," Lily explained as the girl continued to stare Caeden down like he had kicked her dog. "We'll have to explain later. Anyway, she can help you take down the assassin."

Caeden had several questions immediately come to mind, but now wasn't the time. He trusted Lily's judgment more than his own, so he went with it. "Alright. I'm leaving it to you guys to hold that thing in place until I'm recovered."

Immediately, Caeden fell into a trance-like state, pushing all his awareness into controlling Physical Enhancement to quickly and efficiently heal. He ignored the outside world, trusting his friends to protect him.

{}

Caeden was fine. Cat was fine. The thought kept looping through Lily's head as she turned away from her injured boyfriend to focus on the steadily increasing glow coming from inside her iceberg. She had been worried. They arrived at the stone pillars a few days ago, but the area to cover was huge, and inspecting each pillar for signs of the ancient structure took time. They had been miles away when the dome of green fire appeared.

Lily couldn't sense the figure her friends were fighting, nor could she see them through the dome. So she had to wait until she could confirm their location and guarantee no one on her side was nearby. When Caeden pinned their attacker with his thorns, it was a golden opportunity. She made the biggest block of ice she could as fast as she could, with Snowball helping her. He could generate and control ice just like her now that he was a Glacial King Kodiak.

Now the assassin was working their way out, likely using raw heat, from what Caeden had said. Direct thermal energy manipulation was a big weakness for her. That would make containment much harder. But that was nothing new to Lily. Heat manipulation or some variant of it was a common type of domain. She had fought many; many shrouded with similar abilities.

"Hey, Erik." A plan started to form.

"Yeah?"

"Can you get Sauma out here? I want her to wrap this iceberg in as much webbing as she can handle." It would slow the killer down, at the very least, and it might give Lily a chance to work something out.

"No prob." Erik shrugged, his sigil forming over his chest. As the white rendition of a human heart took shape, being ripped and stitched in an endless cycle, thick bands of white, cloth-like shroud flowed out of him and into it.

Lily decided to ignore him for now; she needed to talk with Cat. She took an enhanced leap over to her roommate, who was standing some ways away, covered in a pitch-black cloak that writhed and moved unnaturally. "Hey! I have a plan."

Cat smirked. "Well, you might want to make some adjustments. You met Dave, right?" She paused while Lily nodded. "Well, I summoned Dave from another dimension. Caeden evolved my shroud."

Lily's mind blanked for a moment. There were…so many implications in that one sentence that her brain froze trying to process all of it. "Oh…kay."

"Also, I told him about my gramps. I thought it was only fair, considering what he was doing." Cat shuffled her feet, looking embarrassed for some reason.

"Whatever." Lily shook her head. "If Cae did it, then I'm sure he had a good reason. How much stronger are you?"

"I'm still getting used to the new domain, which is magic, by the way," Lily just rolled with it, letting the shock of that statement settle in the back of her mind. Cat had a magic shroud!!!! And continued to focus on what she was saying. "So I've just been copying over some mnemonics from Soul. I can summon undead equivalent to my specters that are cheaper, stronger, and more durable. They can also use some limited magic."

"So, just better at combat all around, right?" Lily clarified.

"Yup!" Cat chirped, obviously pleased with her new abilities.

"Good for you!" Lily took a moment to congratulate her. She knew this was basically everything Cat had ever wanted. "Here's the plan."

{}

Hekate watched her army set up around the iceberg. The actual ice was no longer visible, covered in a thick layer of Incarnated arachne webbing. Sauma worked quickly, and it took her less than a minute to cover the multi-ton section of ice in a layer of white silky threads.

Lily had her summon several castings of Summon Undead Army worth of undead. So the area around the iceberg was teeming with Undead Soldiers and Undead Archers, all waiting for a fight. Along with them were six Death Knights, weapons drawn, right near the side of the covered iceberg. Lily herself was in front of them, hand set on the only clear spot of ice uncovered by webbing.

From what Lily had told her, Hekate knew she was creating a specific weak point in the ice around the assassin while reinforcing all the other areas. She was forcing it to take the exit they wanted instead of it popping out anywhere across the iceberg's surface. Hekate had no idea if that was working, but that was the plan. Hekate had asked why they didn't just keep the assassin locked in the ice for as long as possible.

Lily told her that it wasn't a bad idea, but it left them open to using all their shroud reserves and the assassin escaping before Caeden was healed. If they let it out and went on the offensive early, they could actually hurt it before their reserves ran dry. Her strategy let them all leverage their powers as a group instead of facing the assassin one-on-one.

"Ready! It's coming through now!" Lily called, Causing Hekate's focus to snap back to the point where her roommate was touching the ice. There was a visible red glow growing brighter and brighter.

A moment later, that section of the ice shattered and melted as a form plowed through. It moved right into the waiting arms of four Death Knights and Lily's longsword. At the same time all five started attacking; a shelf of ice covered in webs jutted out of the glacier above them, closing off the assassin's options. It couldn't just fly out of range anymore.

What followed was a furious dance of back and forth attacks as the assassin tried to beat it's way through Lily and the knights while they all tried to tear it apart. The man-machine was far faster than any of them, even with Lily using infusion to make her body stronger and faster. But collectively, the five could force the assassin to move, interrupting attacks before they could land and jostling it into attacks from others.

Eventually, that balance broke as one of the Death Knights was caught out before anyone else could interrupt. A whip-blade snapped out, coming right under the knight's helmet and taking his head clean off. From there, it was a downhill slide as another knight dropped, then another. With only one knight and Lily left to block it, the assassin broke for open ground.

Once it emerged from under the ice awning, it was met by hordes of undead. Hundreds of them covered the area between stone pillars. The assassin took the obvious route, flying up and over the crowd. At least, it tried to. Immediately it got stuck in the night-invisible webbing that Sauma had stung through the air only twenty feet overhead. More threads began to wrap around him as Sauma tightened the web.

At the same time, dozens of Undead Archers opened fire, raining arrows down on the entangled figure. Several soldiers called up small balls of Necroflame, adding to the ranged barrage. For a moment, Hekate thought they might have finally caught the abomination.

Then it's whip-blades started glowing bright red. With a flick of its mechanical-flesh hands, the blazing metal whipped through the air. Hundreds of strings were severed, arrows and fireballs were intercepted. Lily came in, creating another massive block of ice to drop on it, this one roughly half the size of the first. The assassin didn't even look. Another flick, the block shattered and split. It's turned midair, aiming right for Caeden.

"Dave!" Hekate called as the assassin blasted across the distance. Her War Wight familiar stepped into it's path before it could reach it's target. They locked blades, Dave using a short sword and parrying dagger, both awash in Necroflame. Every time their weapons collided, Dave's weapons would warp under the heat, and the assassin's would rust from the decay. They went back and forth, the exchange continuing much like their last one.

Only this time, Dave wasn't alone.

Just when he was starting to get pressured, a storm of icicles came from behind the assassin, tracking it and forcing it off the higher undead. At the same time, several Undead Soldiers jumped in, forming a ring around Caeden, blocking any easy avenues of attack. More came up and engaged the assassin, holding it's attention long enough for Dave to cast a couple spells that fixed his weapons and armor.

He dove back in, holding down the assassin for even longer. Now, it seemed the man-machine was feeling the pressure as attacks closed in on all sides. Icicles, webbing, undead, and Dave at the forefront all came for it at once. Rather than take the hits, it tried to run away again.

Firing a thermal blast straight up and catching any floating threads that might stop it, the assassin flew high, out of the reach of most of the attacks. Only Lily's icicles could really follow it, and those were taken out by small thermal blasts. It paused in the air overhead, seemingly taking in the forces arrayed against it.

At the same time, Hekate took the opportunity to observe it. The forgettable man disguise it wore was falling apart. The image faded and flickered in places, exposing the nastiness underneath. Each time she got a look, Hekate could see rips in it's mechanical bits and cuts across it's flesh. Raw ether leaked out, causing small bursts of random phenomena in a smaller version of what happened when their cruiser exploded. It's movements weren't as smooth as before; it twitched and jerked at odd moments, like parts of it's body no longer worked.

The assassin machine seemed to realize the situation it was in. Instead of diving back down, it's body began to radiate waves of heat, the air visibly rippling under the effect. Lily created chunks of ice, and Sauma threw more webs, but they all burned before reaching the assassin. Even the arrows Hekate's undead fired would blow off course and burn under the air fluctuations the massive heat was causing. Nothing could reach it.

"Well, looks like my timing is good." A voice spoke from behind her. "Let everyone else know to be ready. I'll knock it down. You all handle the rest." then he was gone.

Hekate looked at where Caeden was recovering. He wasn't there anymore.

{}

Caeden was running low on Physical Enhancement. This was starting to become a common problem for him. His second shroud was more versatile than Sharp, but he couldn't use it nearly as much. He needed to come up with some kind of solution for that if he wanted to keep getting stronger.

But that was a problem for later. Right now, Caeden had enough shroud left to flatten this annoying nuisance once and for all. Or rather, he had enough to make sure that his friends could do the rest. The assassin was in a position where no one but him could take it down easily. Sky would be able to reach, but the Roc wasn't a durable monster. She would likely suffer heavy damage or even die trying to breach the massive heat radiating off the machine-person. No one else could get to it in the air like that. Lily was especially hard-pressed because of the type advantage.

But that was fine. Caeden was already looking down on the assassin from atop a nearby stone pillar. Now that he knew that whatever it was didn't have a shroud, he didn't have to worry about it finding him through aura. It could block his aura somehow, but Caeden doubted it could generate its own aura senses. If it could, it wouldn't need that massive sensor array on its face.

So he was hidden from it, far above. The undead that had been body-blocking for him also stopped the assassin from seeing his stealthy exit. He had slipped through the undead ranks low and quiet. Now, he could attack. But he only had one shot at this. Caeden looked down at the ruined vestiges of his hand. Not just missing two fingers, it was a shriveled mess of missing flesh and ligaments. He could barely hold a weapon, even with Physical Enhancement running through it. His foot was in a similar situation. His whole left side was a ruined mess even after he was healed as much as his shroud could manage.

Gripped in his other hand was Forged Infinity. The dial was set to 065, a truly massive single-bladed war axe. He needed one massive burst of damage to set the assassin on the path of destruction. His injured state removed any finesse from his attacks, so he couldn't think of a better weapon than the axe.

Taking a deep breath in and out, Caeden centered himself. Waves of purple, gold, and red rolled over his shoulders and down his arms as he moved to grip the axe in both hands. His gaze focused squarely on the floating figure below him. He thought briefly about why it was here, who wanted him dead. Maybe it was better to try and capture the abomination. But Caeden found that he was so overwhelmingly tired of the thing that he couldn't bring himself to care. "Time to fuck you up and move on." He murmured, his technique beginning.

"King Bear looked down on the sly badger that had stolen his precious honey. It smirked at him, for it, even though it was cornered, it knew of King Bear's lazy and lackadaisical nature. But King Bear found that today, he did not want to accept this slight. Rather, he wanted to lash out. So that is what he did."

The image of an angry bear ten feet tall formed over Caeden's back, glaring down at the same place he was. His axe thrummed and glowed, a spectral paw forming over it, claws extended.

Then he jumped.

As he did, the technique completed.

"Dragon Arts, technique sixty-six. King Bear."

{}

{Grizzly Chop}

She heard the words coming from above. Hekate watched as Caeden fell through the heat, his body gaining more burns as he cooked all over again. He reached the assassin before it could react, his axe covered in a massive paw of red and gold that slammed into the machine, destroying whatever process it was performing and instantly killing much of the heat. It rocketed toward the sand below.

Right into the path of Erik, who had been waiting this whole time, fists at his waist, ready to strike. And strike, he did.

{Broken Blow}

BOOOOM

The air split and broke under the force of Erik's attack, both fists slamming into the gut of the machine-man just as he passed by on the way into the ground. His arms blurred, and his fists left deep impressions in the metal and flesh of the assassin's torso before he flew off at supersonic speeds. Erik's arms and hands splintered and shattered before he Stitched them back together, the force of the attack too much for his body.

But they weren't finished.

Now it was headed for her. Hekate had a giant ball of Necroflame sitting right in it's path, trusting Erik to aim his blow. Dave was waiting right behind the ball, his great axe in hand and glowing with power. Hekate could see the assassin trying to recover even as it approached at ludicrous speeds. It was more machine than person; the damage they had dealt not yet enough to shut it down. It had resilience on the level of a high IP shrouded. Someone like their teachers.

Caeden and Lily had made the solution obvious. Just keep hitting it until it stopped recovering. The smoking and broken figure entered her ball of flame, rapidly rusting and decaying under so much Necroflame. It exited in the next instant, right into Dave's axe, coming up from beneath it.

His attack was enhanced by a spell increasing its speed and creating two afterimages of the axe on either side. The assassin was hit by all three. It careened back into the air, one of its arms ripped off in the attack. There, it once more tried to recover, twisting itself to try and regain its bearings.

A pillar of flickering white and black light slammed into it from above at an angle, followed immediately by Sky's massive talons and beak as she dove onto it, closing her mouth and stopping the pillar of energy. That dive drove it down into a wall of blue and white fire coming from Snowball's open maw.

It passed through, metal breaking and brittle from all the abuse. It flailed weakly, trying desperately to recover.

Below, waiting for it, was Asherta. She was different from the last time Hekate had seen her. Scales of every shade of blue coated her arms and legs. She had clawed hands and feet, along with wings and a tail. Two horns burst from her temples, all of it in ever-shifting shades of blue. She drew back an open hand, aiming right at the assassin's falling form.

It fell before her, and her arm thrust out, claws spearing through its flesh and metal to emerge out of it's back, holding a human heart beating in her clawed hand. The machine-man went limp.

Everyone moved in quickly; Caeden carried on a platform of ice as he was still heavily injured. They all looked at the broken corpse Asherta had dropped carelessly on the ground.

"So, what do we do now?" Hekate asked, seeing that no one else was talking.

The assassin jerked up, ether flaring. They all jumped as a mechanical voice spoke. "System compromised. Self-destructing in five, four, three, two,