Corvayne glanced over his shoulder as he pushed his weight enhanced body up the stairs ahead. As every other time, he only saw the monochrome blue dungeon behind them, streets and bridges and balconies splattered with glowing blue streaks of hyper conductive 'lava'. He was straining his eyes, searching for any movement in the glowing blue shapes that lit up the city he was leading them through. He had been looking behind him now every five seconds or so for an hour as the group wordlessly followed, keeping their pace by Brines flipping endurance and healing auras. The others didn't slow their pace, but even with their bodies in top shape he could see a sort of weariness in their faces.

Lady Blood Claw was flipping between a camo pattern (Alert or wary) and a color that he was starting to think of as her default, orange (annoyed). Spears had her game face on, the same one she had worn during patrols when they were close to contact with big game. Nyx always looked a little irritated when he wasn't amused but his gestures to everyone else were curt and he nearly bumped Corvayne forward a few times from his shield. Bearer looked relaxed, but she also naturally seemd to swivel her head around. Brines was a wreck, and had his flaming dagger out the entire time, head swiveling to try to look every direction. The only person who didn't seem to be jumpy was Bell. She kept looking forward, her thoughts and worries ahead rather than behind.

Everyone else had spent the last hour whipping their heads all around to simultaneously watch Corvayne and how he was moving around the glowing chunks of electric rocks while also looking for a creature with excellent camouflage that might be stalking the wrong direction... or could possibly be waiting ahead of them to strike.

There was a spot where they saw a stream of water running through the building, falling from a gash in the ceiling to rain down on a barren stone floor in an otherwise empty room. Corvayne steered them away from the puddle, as there was no telling how much current was running through water in these ruins.

He had spent the hour aiming them higher, taking stairs over bridges as they passed the first few blocks and started moving up further than three stories. He was starting to think he had vastly underestimated how much space the city was as they got to a rooftop and could see hundreds of other buildings. Corvayne pulled a length of rope from his ring and secured it to a sturdy looking gargoyle at the corner of the roof they were on. He wrapped the other end of the length around his fist, then used gravity to leap across the gap. The next rooftop further along had a spot where blue electric magma was pooled at the far end, but it didn't stop him from securing the rope. Nyx was already floating across, and Spears leaped and landed next to Corvayne, actually taking a moment to pose with her chin thrust up, one liquid eye open at him. He smiled and mimed clapping.

Lady Blood Claw cast something then crouched by the rope and quickly pulled herself along, hand over hand. Corvayne helped her up when she reached the roof. He saw that it was just Brines, Bearer, and Bell on the other roof. Then a blue hand appeared on the far side of the building.

“Contact!” Corvayne cried out. Bearer turned and saw the monster pull itself up. It was made of bright glowing blue magma, sparking between parts of itself as it righted and looked at them. Then, it put its hands wide, and a bolt of lightning flashed at Brine's feet, knocking him up into the air. Bearer moved fast, catching him and grabbing Bell in the same motion.

“Catch!” She called out, then threw both of them at Corvayne. He fell back as Brines and Bell slammed into him, arms scraping against stone. He quickly struggled to his feet as the electric golem was charging at Bearer-of-Burdens.

She put her fists together and started to slide out of the way, but it didn't seem to matter as a bolt arced through the air, connecting the golem to her shoulder in a blinding clap of white light. She flew back, rolling across a patch of blue magma and jolting as it blasted her against the far lip of the roof.

Corvayne had his spear out and leapt at the golem, activating [Cross-Skill: Sundering Strike] as he landed. For a moment, as he plunged his spear into the blazing blue creature, he was sure he had done serious damage to it, but it turned unhindered by his weapon and backhanded him.

Its fist was pretty soft before he felt a thousand knives of fire passing through him. He only realized he was flying when he saw his friends under him a moment. He landed on another building in a nauseating roll, face, elbows, and knees getting battered by rock, little bits of extra pain on the buzzing agony that was causing his whole body to seize up. Switching back to [Vitality] he forced his cooked muscles to respond as he ground his teeth and tried to get up. It had done something to his diaphragm or lungs too, as he was breathing in ragged gasps.

One of his shadow limbs grew out and started trying to gesture at him. He didn't need to think much about what it was saying. His spear wasn't doing much, and he could see his friends trying to open up with firearms and doing little more than distract the golem. They needed magic, and his own abilities were limited to gravity and shadow... so that's what he was going to use.

Corvayne reached into his ring and found one of the higher quality healing potions from the dungeon. He pulled the cork out with his teeth, and downed the red liquid, the cold tart flavor causing him to twitch a little as he felt it seep into him. A moment later he was un-cooked enough to move. Not a moment too soon, as the attempts of his allies to keep the golem's attention were waning. Lady Blood Claw had done something to slow it, but the monster was turning back to Bearer was. Spear's magic was a bad matchup: Water didn't seem to short it out, and he could see that some of her spears of water magic were carrying its electricity back to her. Brines was trying to get up and get to the rope back, and Bell had a hand on him to try to keep him from running in.

Corvayne switched to [Strength], and activated his gravity power on the golem, as well as trying to tap into [[Grow]], hoping it might make him bigger or at least add heft to his next attack. He didn't feel any bigger, which had him wondering what the pact did, but he didn't waste time. In a moment, the monster would turn its attention back to Bearer.

Corvayne got a running start and jumped across the gap to the building his friends were on, not looking down but focused on the glowing blue monster stomping over to Bearer, and he pulled his spear back and then pointed it forward, shouting wordlessly as he thrust at the golem from at least thirty feet away. [Storm Thrust] hit the man sized creature and sent it flying.

Corvayne aimed another thrust and mid-air connected just before his gravity power snapped, sending it tumbling across a roof back near the beginning of the city.

He pulled gravity back into himself and lightened himself to help Bearer up. He could feel Brines healing starting to work, but it just outlined how many aches and pains he had as he threw Bearer over his shoulder. The woman groaned. “You idiots... I coulda taken him if you guys had just left me.”

“Oh, would we have gotten in your...” he paused to lower their gravity and leap across to the others. He huffed a little bit as he spoke the last bit. “..Way?”

“Yes.” Bearer started coughing.

Corvayne set her down carefully, then sat for a moment. He could see Spears had lost her form a little, and was twitching. Lady Blood Claw was busy making sure Bell and Brines were given small doses of Mister I's potions. Nyxion was rebooting his belt and coiling his whip. He gave Bearer a potion then moved to Spears-Like-Water and sat by her blobby form, something like a fat ball with watery limbs coming out.

Spears manifested a single eye in the middle of her body and looked up at Corvayne.

“Ah... water and electricity...” She sounded embarassed.

“Lean on me for a while.” Corvayne picked her and her clothes up, and placed her on his back. She gripped around him like the backpack he had been wearing before, and with a few touches her cloak formed a bundle. He slotted her spear between her and his back, which earned him a little poke from his girlfriend turned accessory.

“Sorry, but I want you to have it in case...”

“Corvayne, getting shocked fucks up whatever it is that actually holds me together. Gimme a few hours with that healing aura.”

Reading between the lines... even attacking the monster had nearly killed her. “We bought ourselves at least a few minutes. It can move past the lava flows, but it has to climb up.”

Nyxion overheard him. “I know you are mister 'Always calm' but you make it sound like it didn't just track us down and HAND us OUR asses!”

Corvayne Paused. “Lady Blood Claw, is it more or less dangerous than Argyle?”

She barely paused lifting Brines and Bell. “Less. Easily.”

While Corvayne agreed with her, Spears made an unhappy burbling sound, Brines groaned, Bell swore in her native tounge, and Bearer laughed a little which turned into a hissing intake of breath.

“It's a bad matchup for killing it, but it's only dangerous if we are close to it.”

Nyxion had his arms folded. “Well, we are going to have to go up and down these buildings to get wherever we are going. Please tell me you have a plan for dealing with turning a corner on the street and having piles of lava blocking us.”

Corvayne nodded. “I do, but I'm going to need your help Nyx. And Brines as well.”

He saw Nyx slow in his float near him and Spears. “What's your plan? This better not be another smoke and mirrors.”

“I'm going to throw everyone across the gaps. Health aura while I toss, stamina while I jump over. You catch people so we don't take too much pain. Brines can you do that?”

“I wish I had a go-home aura right about now.”

Nyx floated over the gap and clapped his hands. “Go ahead and throw him first. He's probably the most aerodynamic. Hurry it up, I don't want that thing to blow out another shield belt.” He snapped a few times so Corvayne picked Brines up and launched him, gravity and his [Strength] only tiring him a little. There was a soft 'Oof' from either Brines or Nyxion. He turned to Lady Blood Claw.

“If your hand strays anywhere odd I swear-”

Corvayne swept the large alien woman off her feet in a princess carry for one moment, and as she turned deep blue and leaked embarrassment through [[Unity]] he threw her like a sack of potatoes across the gap to where Nyx braced himself to catch her.

Bearer held up a finger, and did a cartwheel off the edge of the building they were on then somehow jumped in mid-air. She didn't account for her injuries and bowled into Nyx, who stood his ground and just looked down in amusement.

“You looked real cool. Then real stupid.”

Bearer shrugged and pushed herself back to her feet. “When the bards sing my tale, I will float like a swan.”

Bell was last. Corvayne picked her up, and saw she had her eyes closed tight. He hesitated a moment, and she opened her eyes and glared at him. He felt desire leaking through her, fear being suppressed by the princesses hunger for family. To try to save her daughter. It made him feel guilty for a moment. He felt that determination surge.

“Don't be a coward, thro-”

He threw her.