My petal-scales dragged me to the edge of Keratily’s crystal pillars. I wasn’t one-hundred percent sure, but I had a feeling she’d instantly know if I tried to leave the field they’d created. So I had to do everything in one swift motion. That was easier said than done, and I physically couldn’t talk at the moment.

{I can’t make the weapon.} I finally said after a whole lot of risky trial and error with morphing my weapon. {But I can make up for the differences with my petal-scales. Will that be good?}

Okeria’s drone flitted from side to side. {It’ll have to be. But why won’t your weapon morph like ya want it ta? Shouldn’t it listen ta ya?}

I didn’t have a concrete answer for him. My working theory was that my weapon was under the same constraints as the petal-scale function itself; it was missing five-sixths of the whole. Maybe once I went back and cleared the other seasons of the floodforest I’d have greater control over it, but for now, I was stuck with making weapons that could be made with simple materials and knowledge alone.

{No clue. Also not the time. What’s the risk?}

{What’s the risk? The fact that I’ve gotta tap into not just your weapon–which is real weird on its own–but now I’ve also gotta factor in a function that somehow melds with the weapon. Introducin’ a second variable makes everythin’ so much more complicated.}

{Fair enough. How long?}

{How long for what? Until I’m ready–about fifteen seconds. From when I send over the function to when it hits you–about two seconds. For how long you’ll have before Keratily scatters ya like dust on the wind–drown me if I know.}

Such a vote of confidence. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes for a second, then opened them to the exact same visage of continuous violence that Inopsy and Keratily had continuously been presenting. There was no way I was killing her with this. I had to accept that, even if it was a nice fantasy to pretend like I was on their monstrous level. Even Okeria’s help didn’t elevate me that much.

So I needed to be a distraction. One that would kill her focus just enough for the hydra to spawn. I could do that. Inopsy would capitalize on the chaos, and as long as she had to split her focus to fight for a little while, we could clear the hazard. But if she was a true monster, then I’d have to lure her away from the hydra and back again. Which… well… I’d just have to hope Okeria’s aid included lightning speed.

{Time’s good. Give me a two-second heads-up for whenever you’re gonna do it.}

Okay. No more stalling. I tensed my mind and forced all my thoughts to be of forcing myself to move, then carefully shifted my weapon into the ‘spear’ part of the blueprint Okeria had sent me. I shaped the rest of it with petal-scales, carefully setting them in place to create a slightly off facade of what he truly needed. All the parts were a little too mobile, but they’d have to work.

The fight raged on. Keratily and Inopsy traded heavy blows that would’ve pulped me five times over. I waited and waited for the perfect moment when Inopsy went in for one of his coal explosions–Keratily had to block those, and she took a second after to recover. One came far sooner than I expected.

{Two seconds.} I decreed as Keratily skidded back a few steps.

Electricity coursed through my veins and into my arm. I tensed at the shift in the general vibe of the battlefield even though nothing had visibly shifted, but I knew Keratily was less than a heartbeat away from pouncing at me.

I took a single step backwards that carried me the length of a dozen. Okeria’s lightning arced over my weapon and threatened to destroy my petal-scales, but it looked like I’d be able to keep them from disappearing for long enough. I raised my arm and shifted into a perfect stance for the throw, ignoring all the pain signals my body was sending me as warnings against Okeria’s intrusive function.

The petal-scales grew white hot. A keening shriek split my right eardrum and reverberated against my left like a jet taking off right next to me. Arcs of electricity broke through the petal-scale housing and slashed through the dusty ground, leaving burned scars and glassy debris wherever they touched.

Okeria’s voice roared through my helmet.

{Prep ready! DO IT!}

He didn’t have to tell me twice. I reared back and threw the spear with all my might, keeping the petal-scale container glued to my hand as it did the rest of the work. Light and monstrous amounts of electricity coursed through my body and the world in my immediate vicinity, blinding everything around me as I belted out a warning that I probably should’ve sent out earlier.

{Opening! USE IT!} I screamed in text-to-speech at Inopsy.

Something exploded. Something else shattered. My armor worked quickly and efficiently to repair the damage Okeria’s weapon had done to me, and in the seconds it took for the world to reappear, a picture of what had happened was painted for me.

Keratily stood there dumbfounded, her hands on her stomach where a fist-sized hole had bored straight through her. Cracks shot through her crystalline coating like miniature lightning bolts, and for some reason, she wasn’t repairing it. It didn’t last long enough. She raised her hands, snapped straight to me, and shifted like she was about to push off in my direction.

Inopsy shoved a plug of concentrated explosion into the wound. Keratily didn’t notice for a second. Then he reared back and slammed his knee into her side before she could charge me.

That was the first time I’d seen someone explode from the inside. Shards of crystal and body parts flew everywhere like a morbid pinata, leaving what was left of Keratily struggling to stand with about a quarter of a skeleton and not much in the way of flesh. It gave me a good look at what Staura biology looked like when it was horribly fucked up for all of two seconds.

{Holy fuck. Did it work?} I breathed in disbelief.

Before I’d even gotten my fourth word out, crystals enveloped Keratily like a cocoon. Inopsy slammed his fist into it at full-tilt, but instead of impacting it, he was pushed away.

{Damn it all, I really hoped the cooldown wasn’t back for this bullshit.} He spat in frustration. {This thing reverses any hostile force thrown at it while she regenerates. What’s the plan?}

I snapped to the hydra. The pile of light and creation burbled like an untouched spring, and the creature started to emerge. Unlikely plan ‘A’ had failed, but that was as expected. And it looked like plan ‘B’ was well on the way to actually becoming a thing.

{Stall her.} I ordered. {Make sure she hits the hydra once before it dies so she gets credit for the clear.}

Inopsy nodded off in the distance. {Heard loud and clear. If this is the same as last time, she’ll be out of commission for another fifty seconds. Make the best of that time.}

Not much left for me to do, but I appreciated a few seconds to take a mental breather. I let my arms dangle at my sides uselessly as my armor worked to repair the damage Okeria’s aid had done and just took everything in. We’d managed to pierce Keratily’s barrier. Her one or two-inch thick barrier. And apparently that was weaker than the crystals Annette had destroyed.

Her function really was terrifying. All the more reason to try and keep her on our side and from turning into the glow-moss I remembered.

{Seb? Ya still there? That attack put our comms on the fritz, and I can’t tell if what I’m seein’ is real or a distorted mess.}

I looked around for Okeria’s drone. I found half of it twitching on the ground with liquid electricity dripping out of it like blood. The thing nipped at my hand when I went to pick it up, but the pain wasn’t anything worse than what moving felt like.

{I’m here Okeria. Can you see me?} I asked and held the drone up to my visor.

{Drown me, that’s blurry. Is that supposed ta be your head? It looks more like someone twisted a chunk of metal into some kind of modern art.} Okeria muttered to himself as the electricity around me shifted and crackled. {Okay, I’m running a recovery process right now. Huck the drone at least a few feet away from ya.}

I flicked the drone over my shoulder as electricity burst free from it. Horrible sounds echoed out as a spray of molten metal splattered against my back. The spray only lasted a second before it froze in mid-air, sparked with thin lightning bolts that connected it to the drone, and snapped back like they were connected by rubber bands.

The new drone flitted up from the ground, made more of electricity than metal than it had been a second ago. It buzzed up to me and landed on my shoulder as Okeria’s voice came through much clearer.

{Wow. The two of ya actually managed ta get Keratily ta use her cocoon in a timely fashion. What’d ya do, blow her up from the inside?}

{Yes.}

{...Wish I could’a seen that. Alright, I don’t think I gotta tell ya this, but Keratily’s gonna be gunnin’ for ya now. Be extremely careful.}

The hydra screeched in the throes of existence. Inopsy stared at it with his expression hidden behind his helmet, then turned to me and held his arms out in a ‘what now’ motion. Honestly, aside from getting Keratily to kill it, there wasn’t much else to do. Either it worked or it didn’t.

{The plan is the same. Put yourself between me and Keratily and don’t let her get a free shot on me. And please don’t pulp me with one of those coal explosions again. That wasn’t a pleasant experience.} I said a little more eloquently as electricity aided my text-to-speech thoughts. {Oh, and I probably should’ve told you this before–do not accept the reward for clearing this place. It’s our only hope for curing the people Dylan fucked up, and our last option for dealing with Keratily.}

{Gotcha, chief.} Inopsy said with a salute. {Crystal’s starting to crack. Be ready.}

As if brought on by INopsy’s words, Keratily’s crystal cocoon burst open. She emerged in a suit of crystal armor twice as thick as before with the shards of the cocoon orbiting her like moons. Inopsy shifted slightly and glanced off to the side, then dove to stop the horrifically fast sprint Keratily broke into.

The hydra didn’t stand a chance. Forget making sure Keratily got a single hit in–the thing was obliterated by her armor and finished off by the draining capabilities of her pillars. I barely had time to register what had happened before I forced my everything to move, charging into Keraatily’s blind rage and sliding under her arm that came down with an axe-like edge formed from crystal. My petal-scales shifted the ground under my feet to speed me up and slow her down just a little, but it barely did anything. Inopsy was tossed aside like a used rag, and even though he pulled himself together almost immediately, it wasn’t fast enough.

Keratily was on my tail. I forced my body past the point of pain, using electricity to push beyond my limits and oil to make sure I didn’t tear myself apart in the middle of doing so. It felt like constantly tearing all of my muscles on the push, stapling them together in the moments between that step and the next, and tearing them all over again right after.

I slammed into the throne. My vision spun.

{I request an audience with Acasiana and Moricla!}