The process of isolating the divine portion that might be within my Avatar, a remnant of the creation of its race, proved as difficult as one should expect. I had spent a couple of days trying to isolate it within myself, had tried to delve into the bodies of Sigmir and Ylva, trying to get an idea what I was looking for and there was very little progress. I had gained a point each in Blood Magic and, curiously, Astral Meditation but had achieved nothing that would constitute a breakthrough.

By the time we discovered traces of Manticore-activity, mosty the remains of their hunts, both digested and undigested, but also some other tracks, I was almost looking forward to the encounter. It gave me something to think about, other than the riddle of Divine Blood and Power. Talking to Olivia had helped, to a point, though she had completely stone-walled me regarding the idea to use her, filled with Divine Power after her morning prayers, as a test-subject in my experimentation. While frustrating, I could somewhat empathize with her, especially given the, deservedly, horrible reputation of Blood-Magic and the other bodily subtypes of Life-magic. Only Mind-Magic had a worse reputation, which made quite a bit of sense. But that was neither here nor there.

“I think that’s one of them.” Lenore said, speaking out loud from her perch on my shoulder. She was alternating between sitting on my shoulder or resting within her Hallow and hadn’t taken to the sky since we spotted the first actual, physical evidence that we were in Manticore-territory. The idea of meeting such a beast in the sky scared her more than she wanted to admit, a sentiment I could understand.

Looking up, the connection between us helped guide my focus to a distant object in the blue sky above us. At first, when just scanning the sky, it was difficult to make out anything but when focusing, my high Intuition allowed me to almost zoom in on it, showing that attributes made a huge difference. In this case, I was able to determine that it was indeed a Manticore, not just an eagle or other large bird flying over the mountains. Distance was more difficult to estimate, though it didn’t really matter how far it was from us, given that it was obviously coming towards us.

“It’ll be here in a minute or two.” Adra estimated, looking up as well, before looking around for a moment. “There’s only one of them and I don’t see any cover nearby. Everyone remembers the tactic we have discussed?” she asked, getting affirmative mumbles in response.

We changed our formation a little, Adra making sure that her Bow was ready, casually holding it by her side before it was time to draw, while I stepped next to her, mentally forming the runes I was going to use. Our job was to take away the Manticore’s major advantage, its mobility, to ground it and allow us to fight it without allowing it to easily escape.

Soon, the Manticore was close enough to make out without fully focusing on it, and I had a reasonable estimation of the distance. and began drawing runes of Ice, with a couple Blood-Runes thrown in for good measure. I had more than enough time to carefully draw all seven runes, as my lips curled into a smile. The creature was either arrogant or foolish, coming towards us without any care at all, thinking itself the master of these mountains.

Next to me, Adra drew back her bow, whispering a chant under her breath and her arrow was shrouded in azure light, the air suffused with the smell of Wind-Magic.

Just before the Manticore was upon us, we both unleashed our attacks within a split-second of each other. The central rune of my formation glowed silver and a small Icicle leading a beam of pure cold lanced out, crossing the distance in a moment and piercing the Manticore’s wing, striking right next to the joint into the muscle. The Icicle itself was tiny, compared to the monster’s size, optimised for speed and penetration, not stopping-power, but the Icicle wasn’t the dangerous part of the spell. That was reserved for the glittering beam of pure cold and the runes of blood I had woven into the spell. Once the beam hit the blood drawn by the initial Icicle, the energy hungrily took hold, ripping the warmth from the creature's body as I pumped in power.

Almost at the same time, Adra’s arrow struck, too, piercing through the wing a little further out, ripping a hole into the delicate membrane before shredding the surrounding feathers when the azure energy held within the arrow exploded outwards.

The previously graceful glide of the Manticore, aiming to use its claws to savage one of us before ascending back into the skies and out of our reach, turned into an uncontrolled tumble as forward momentum teamed up with gravity, the left wing no longer able to support the beast’s wight. Or do anything, really, the combined attack had crippled the beast, permanently removing it from the sky. Now, we just had to make sure that it didn’t suffer for long.

Physics proved to be a harsh mistress, even when it came to monstrous creatures the Manticore’s impact on the ground caused a sound that made me reflexively wince in sympathy, at least for a brief moment.

Sigmir had been on stand-by, ready to approach the wounded beast and draw its attention, shielded by Olivia’s magic. Clad in her red aura, she struck the still prone beast with her axe, causing a relatively small, bloody wound, proving just how tough the monster actually was, before being forced on the defensive as the vicious tail-singer lashed out, trying to skewer her.

Now that the wings were out of commision, the tail was the major danger of the Manticore and according to our tactic, it was our next target. But before I started casting my next spell, I took a brief second to Observe the beast.

Young Manticore, level 89

If one only looked at the level, it was weak, weak enough that none of us should have any problem with it. But the massive stinger that crashed into Sigmir’s shield with enough force to make me flinch from the noise made it clear that level wasn’t everything, as I very well knew. I had killed higher level targets before, mostly by surprising them and not giving them anything remotely close to a fair fight. Something we would have to do here, too, even if the monster had a much lower level.

My next runic formation was simpler than the first one I had used, but more focused in a way. The first had focused on penetration and the subsequent chilling, this one ignored the penetration entirely, instead targeting the already bleeding wound. Using a curse similar to the one I had used on the Lycantroll, I began draining away its power and here, the difference in level became apparent. The Manticore became sluggish, its movements no longer having the ferocity it displayed earlier, instead moving almost as if it was drunk, as it’s very blood turned into shackles weighing it down.

It was a massive opening, especially when Sigmir used her shield to bash against the Manticore, knocking it off balance, and Rai had waited in the shadows for just such an opening, His task had been to disable the beast’s stinger if possible, or the hindlegs if the stinger proved impossible. Taking out the stinger would rob it of its deadliest weapon, taking out a hindleg would rob it of its mobility, either would make the fight a lot easier.

Even I, with my affinity for Darkness-magic, had failed to accurately track what Rai had done, after he had hidden in the Manticore’s shadow after it had crashed down, but however he had done it, the sight of the stinger drooping down limply caused me to nod in approval. He had managed to almost sever it, certainly neutralising it in the process, and greatly pissed the Manticore off in the process. It’s reaction was one of pure instinct, it had been hurt and wanted to punish the person that hurt it, so it twisted around with a roar of pain and rage, swiping with its paws - at nothing but shadows.

I was quite sure he had still taken some damage, similar to the damage I had taken from the Lycantroll, but showing its back to Sigmir and Adra was the last mistake the Manticore made, for the two of them used the opening presented and ended the fight. Adra’s spear dug deep into the Manticore’s side, skewering it and ripping apart its organs, while Sigmir’s axe struck a crushing blow into its spine. Those two attacks, together with the curse running through its body, was enough to make it crumble, weakly batting at the air with its front-paws before stilling shortly after.