Precognition ignited within me and lightning flared; as the world slowed once more, I leaned back whilst stepping, just barely avoiding the slash of one green-covered foot.

“Well, isn't this a pleasant surprise?”

Behind V’s glowing back, I saw Darina engaging with McCreepy but I soon lost track of her as the dull, glowing form of Reff barrelled into our apparent escapee.

I took a moment to look at my sword; the blade ended a few inches from the guard, shared cleanly off in a way that seemed almost machined. It seemed that my time compression did not extend far from my body, and either the act of compressing time itself had cut the sword, or the relative difference in speed had. Tossing the hilt back into storage, I hope I would be able to improve that aspect, but in the meantime, I had a fight to take part in.

Reff was fighting V, the jungle lit by their respective armours; as I turned to look, I saw Riffa’s puppets smash through the vegetation to join her brother. Knowing how dangerous the beast cultivator was, I was about to add my own assistance to mix when Instinct pulled me to the side, narrowly avoiding the now airborne form of Darina. Without thought, I drove power into my Focus, gripping the earth with tendrils of Praxis as I reached out to grab the apprentice’s foot, arresting her movement. With a grunt of effort, I absorbed her momentum, and before she could hit the floor, I had already turned to face the figure jerkily stepping towards us.

Over the last week, I had gained a better understanding of the energy available to me, and as my Core pulsed slow and deep I once more felt the death’s head grin split my face as I pulled on my Praxis, forcing as much as I could through my Focus as I went to meet them.

Time crawled as the two of us closed the distance, light flowing and snapping in violet-white ropes thicker than my thigh, the screech of splitting air quieting the jungle around us. Stepping past a too-long punch I slammed my shoulder into the arm and it was pushed away with a blast of light and heat, my lightning reacting with the metal of their armour in a way I had seen before; an arc blast. I was ready for it, and I absorbed the shock and ignored the burn, stepping into to drive my fist into the featureless plate of the thing’s helmet.

Another blast rocked my opponent back and once more doing my best to ignore the damage it did to me, I immediately followed it up with another punch and that time I felt flesh give beneath the blow.

The figure teetered back, off balance, and taking advantage of that fact was as simple as stepping into a kick, driving my whole weight and strength into it; accelerated by my increased speed and lent weight by the arc blast, McCreepy was sent smashing back into the darkness with a flash of sparks.

With only one foot on the ground, the blast knocked me off balance and I tumbled to the ground, but the grin never faded and I quickly leapt to my feet just as Darina did. It was good to be fast.

“You should help Reff and Riffa, I have this; the armor doesn’t like my lightning.”

“It is too early to be so cocky, Hunter. I wi-”

There came a dry clicking from the shadow laden forest, interrupting us. Tensing, the two of us dropped into guard stances as the figure came back into sight, their awkward steps closing the distance with surprising alacrity. As they passed beneath a gap in the canopy, I could make out the rent and split armour of their torso, revealing blackened scorch marks on pale, fish-belly white flesh. But their face... their face was a nightmare, the plate which had covered it completely destroyed. In its place was a map of scarred flesh, a dozen different hues in the pale light. Lidless eyes filled with dark blood stared out at us from atop a missing nose and sharpened teeth laid bare by a lack of lips.

Caught staring at the hellscape of missing flesh, we almost missed the start of the thing’s assault; the over-long arms snapped out with no warning, going from absolutely still to full-motion, skipping the intervening motions entirely.

One metal-clad fist snapped into Darina’s bone plates and there was a sharp crack as the apprentice was forced back a step, a fracture clearly visible in her armour.

The other fist was meant for me and once again my choice of abilities saved me, the warning provided by Instinctive Precognition shaking me from my shock in time to sway out of range of the deceptively long limb. As I dodged, half a dozen ropes of light lashed out and locked into the medallic arm and there came another blast of light and heat which forced the two of us apart.

Uncaring of the damage to her plating, or perhaps merely having healed it already, Darina took the opportunity to attack once more. Her fists, feet and head lashing out at the walking horror show. Without a word I joined her, making sure to strike the metal armour in places the blast would affect her the least.

Blast after blast rang out between the trees as I drove my fist forward again and again, uncaring of the accumulation of damage to my fist, just trying to deprive the thing of its protection. After several moments of blows, the armour hung in ragged scraps, though it didn’t seem to care. Beneath the formerly protective layer, the McCreepy was an amalgamation of mismatched stretches of flesh, all flowing together as if made from melted wax. Partially crystallised bones jutted out at random places, piercing the deathly pale flesh cleanly and catching the light, the play of refracted light only highlighting the unnatural reality of our foe.

There was a momentary pause in our fight as Darina was once again knocked back, her aggressive style leaving her somewhat vulnerable to momentarily exiting fights. As the apprentice once more vanished amidst shadows, the figure turned to me, its head turning first, independently of the rest of its body. As the head turned, its rolling eyes locked on to me one at a time and without warning the body spun to face me, both arms lashing out, and it was fast without the armour.

Reacting ahead of each blow, given indication only by my unique abilities, I danced around the attacks, my speed and perception increased to a point far beyond what a Path stage cultivator should be able to achieve. In a second that seemed to last for hours the two of us clashed, but despite the fact that I still held the edge in speed, now that the thing’s armour had been mostly destroyed, my lightning seemed to be having almost no effect, perhaps singing its unresponsive flesh even as it ignored the impact of my fist.

Recalling the account my friends had given of their own first fight with McCreepy, I considered trying to break its arms, but with only one of my own the only way I could think to do it involved practically climbing the thing, unless I could find a suitable moment to and angle to land a blow in just the right place...

… Almost slapping myself mid-fight I sidestepped one sweeping blow and drove power into my arm, concentrating the power of my Exemplar there while maintaining my lightning throughout my body. Time sped up slightly, but the effect was not enough to allow me to be caught unaware, so I dismissed the difference, my focus on my arm as time compressed once more.

With a snap I regained control of my limb just as the pale creature’s arm was smashed into its own chest, in turn causing it to be flung backwards to skid along the damp ground until it came to an abrupt stop by the base of a tree..

I could see the arm was bent at an odd angle, and I felt a moment of triumph as I heard a cry from above me and looked up to see Darina falling towards the fallen thing. In my mind, I pictured the apprentice landing on the thing and crushing breaking it fully, it seemed a very Darina thing to do, but that is not what happened. Instead, with the sudden movements of an insect the creature was suddenly on its feet, and as Darina, unable to change her trajectory, landed, it lashed out with its unbroken arm and I heard another crack as I saw for the second time the apprentice’s head at the wrong angle to her body as she dropped.

I stood staring at the body of my friend in shock; I knew, intellectually, that she would probably be back on her feet in a couple of seconds, but that is a hard thing for a guy from Earth to internalise, so I felt anger welling up in me; before, this fight had been a thing that needed to be done – it was moral, and right, but when all was said and done it was a job had been given. But this thing had hurt my friend, and I was just about done with that happening.

The strange drive clicking came again, and I realised this thing was laughing. It was laughing at killing my friend.

I felt the world around my shrink until it was just it and me, the scope of my focus narrowing to a single goal; annihilation.

Praxis thundered inside of myself, as much as I had ever willingly spent at one time and I felt my Core thrum into motion as my power drained into the lightning. I could feel the electricity vibrating in my channels, but whereas once it may have connected through me, shocking me out of the fight, this time it was held back by a soft grey-white energy and the light broke out of me like a storm, no longer tendrils or ropes, but a network of blazing lines that filled the air like a fog, screaming my mounting rage into the heavens.

Kicking off, I rushed the target of my anger, my throat burning with ozone as I sucked in a breath. Reaching it before it could so much as twitch, I laid into it over and over again, my fist falling in a torrent, driving it helplessly into the tree behind it.

I under a second, the creature’s head collapsed, driven past its breaking point by the rain of blows and I stepped back, panting and letting the lightning fade back to a more normal level.

Hurrying over to where Darina lay in the dirt, I slapped out several fires that had mysteriously sprang to life around her just as her neck straighten with a sickening crunch.

With a sigh of relief, I grabbed her arm and helped her to her feet as she moved her head about as if trying to crack her neck.

“I took care of... that thing... We should go help Reff and Riffa!”

“You did? Good job! Let’s-” As the apprentice turned to look behind me, her eyes widened and Instinctive Precognition screamed; Focusing hard again, the world slowed and knowing she would be fine, I grabbed Darina’s arm once more and jumped straight up. Sort of.

“I thought you said you took care of it!”

“I smashed it’s head! How is that not taking care of it?!”

“Maybe if you-”

We landed before she could say anything else and I bent my knees to absorb the impact and so did Darina, resulting in us lightly headbutting one another.

With a brief glare, the apprentice stepped around me to rush back to the fight and shaking my head I joined her, running past several more mysterious small fires and smouldering plants.

As I moved, I considered our opponent, now visible a short distance away, its near headless body already turning towards us, the remnants of its skill falling down its chest and back, still attached by strips of skin. Shuddering a little, tried to imagine how he was still standing... without a head. From what I knew of cultivation, it all started with your Focus, in your first centre; the head was the seat of the third centre, I was sure, so perhaps this thing had a Focus or Path that allowed him to function without... a head. I knew Darina could operate, at least a little, with a broken neck, so it almost made sense. Which meant one thing; one down, two to go.

“Darina, try and destroy the gut, go for wherever the energy centre is! I’ll take the heart!”

“... Fine!”

As we closed again, Darina formed long jagged spurs from her plated arms and from a closer perspective, I noticed a faint silver light where the head should have been, but I did not have time to take a closer inspection, the fight recommenced.

Darina was fighting with more caution now, actively blocking rather than simply absorbing blows and clearly waiting for her chance to strike. In an effort to divide its focus, if such a thing was even possible for a thing with no head, I circled around it and came as it from the back. Perhaps knowing that I was too fast for it to easily counter, it ignored me, instead seemingly intent on taking down Darina. Again.

With a half-shrug, I skidded to a halt directly behind it and with a grunt of effort compressed time again along my arm, pumping huge amount of Praxis into it and finally allowing it to strike. With the growing familiarity of relinquishing control to the eddies of time, I felt my Exemplar pulse and there came the sound of a crack, simultaneously with the sound of something bursting.

Looking down, I saw a hole roughly the side of my fist in McCreepy’s back, and though that hole I could see the grim, gore covered face of Darina. Wincing a little at the thought of splattering the thing’s heart all over my friend, and tensing for a response from it, but none came. There was a grunt, followed by a sticky, wet sound and the figure collapsed between us. Blinking, I looked down to see a massive cavity on the front of its chest, as well as a jagged gap in its stomach; it seemed we had both struck at the same time... and I had somehow blown most of its chest off.

Not wanting to bring up the apprentice’s gore covered state, I nodded quickly and turned away to search for our other friends in the odd quiet of the night.