Mash stood on the ground, surrounded. He stood firmly, though his body ached from more than one wound. Inwardly, he apologized to Luke in case his aspect destroyed the island. Outwardly, he grinned like a mad fool, excited beyond belief to finally use his power. The connection to his aspects was deep and natural. He didn’t use nearly as much energy to bring it into the world. The space above his head changed as something of pure uncontrolled power made its presence known.

The aspect of change appeared differently this time. Its form seemed more solid. A rainbow orb of multicolored light, that shone with a different radiance than the sun. Instantly the world around it began to warp. The grass turned greener, while some of the trees turned to water. Mash fell at his own body and noticed nothing. The aspect’s power grew more intense, and Mash saw it in his domain. While he seemed unaffected, the others were reacting. Toroken began twitching violently, his wings moving awkwardly as something about him changed. The silvery elf’s body shimmered faintly as though he were fading away. In the distance the fiery archer had fallen to the ground, his eyes closed.

It was the last person that gave Mash a clue about what was happening. The black-furred beastmen clutched at his wounds, and Mash watched as the black blood running from his chest turned red. Mash senses caught up with him a second later. Toroken roared behind him, a deafening screech that made the very air shake. At the same moment, the puppets Mash had created earlier vanished, not that they had been particularly useful.

The aspect’s glow grew brighter and brighter. It grew so bright to blind them for a moment, the whole world seemed to drown in the light. Then it vanished, leaving his eyes scored by blurry images. It disappeared as suddenly as it appeared. Mash blinked furiously, as he tried to adjust to the odd changes in the light. It didn’t actually matter too much with his domain. The world around him had been changed though. Some trees had changed form; metal replaced their wooden bark. Some leaves changed from green to blue and dripped water from their ends. Other leaves were orange, and they seemed hot as the air around them shook.

The black and red markings that sealed him had dissolved under the rainbow light of his aspect. Priscilla, unbothered by the sudden changes, healed him as soon as she was able. His wounds closed, though phantom pain still lingered from them. The fight had been too close, and Mash wasn’t about to miss any opportunities now.

Amid the confusion, Mash turned toward the silvery elf. The elf had frozen on the ground, standing with his hand mere inches from his face. It seemed like the elf was searching for something. Mash didn’t give him the time to find it, rushing the elf in a quick sprint. He moved more freely as if the world itself had decided to stop impeding him. It was probably just the increases in his attributes, but it felt like something special after his aspect. The elf reacted slowly; a panicked response escaped from his lips as he took a step back.

“Wait! Something’s wrong!”

The elf’s yelp didn’t make Mash hesitate. He struck out with a quick jab; it was much faster than before, and the elf was reacting slowly too. He aimed at the elf’s shoulder, and to his surprise, managed to hit cleanly. The elf barely even reacted to the strike, and Mash’s fist went straight through the man’s shoulder. Bright red blood painted Mash’s hand as the elf’s arm was separated from his body. The elf fell to the ground as blood spurted from the wound. The elf released a pained cry, a wail like a kicked cat.

Toroken roared as he tried to move, and Mash recognized the sound. The dragon was in pain. Whatever the aspect had done, it made it so that these people felt pain again, and the dragon still had plenty of broken bones. Mash realized that the dragon wasn’t healing like before either. His wings remained a broken mess, and the elf too seemed unable to process the pain.

The dragon’s roars of pain became the call for the end of the fight. The elf crumpled to the ground; tears streamed from his eyes as he clutched at the missing arm. The beastman was bleeding on the ground unconscious in the distance, dark red blood seeped from his wounds. Only the archer remained. Mash scanned his surrounding and saw the man kneeling on the ground. It looked like he was praying for some reason. That sight made Mash pause.

In that momentary pause, he felt something grab him. Ephemeral hands of strange power radiated with a weird purple light within his domain. It grabbed him like a ball and yanked him from where he stood. He was lifted from the ground and thrust through the forest. He crashed through several trees as he was pulled. The air rushed past his ears, and each impact with a tree left was followed by a loud crashing noise. Mash focused on the restraints and used his aura to drain them. The hands that gripped him were odd. They didn’t restrain his physical body at all but it had gripped him on a deeper level. Luke? That was Mash’s first inclination, but the color of the mana didn’t match. Either way, it only took a few seconds for him to disperse the mana.

He didn’t immediately look for a new enemy though. His domain let him see most of the island now, and he could see Luke and several people standing at the entrance to the mountain. They were all talking frantically, clearly surprised by something. Mash leaped over the trees and flew toward them. The rush of familiar power that came with a level up, told Mash that the fight was over. Now, he just needed to figure out what that even meant. Considering that everyone was still alive, he guessed that meant Luke succeeded. Why did he level though?

Mash dove toward Luke and the others. He called out to them as he touched the ground.

“Well, what happened?”

They stared at him with obvious confusion. Luke seemed to hesitate to respond too. When he did, it was with noticeable doubt.

“Mash, you look… different.”

That statement caught Mash a little off guard. He had somehow forgotten about that fact, but now that Luke brought it up, Mash really wanted to see himself in the mirror. The black and red lines from the knife earlier had already vanished. Although, there were a few more urgent things to ask about.

“So? I look different all the time. What happened here?”

Luke didn’t answer right away, the girl beside him did. Mash could roughly estimate her power, and he was surprised to feel outclassed, at least as far as raw power went.

“Our best guess was that you brought them back to life somehow.”

Mash met her eyes and found that the red glow of her pupils was oddly familiar. It was like Red’s eyes in the past. He assumed that she was the necromancer and hesitated. How should he talk to her? Another thought pushed its way past the question. The broken, probably dying people he had abandoned back there.

“Um, we should probably go heal them then. They, uh, will need it.”

Mash expected Luke to shout or something. Luke didn’t, he just traded glances with the necromancer before taking off at a run. Both of them ran past Mash for a moment, but he quickly caught up and began leading them to the worst injured first. Toroken’s roars meant that the dragon was probably fine. So, he led them first to the armless beastmen.

It was a gruesome scene. Mash hadn’t really taken in the raw amount of gore his fight had produced until this very moment. The surrounding area had been torn up and littered with viscera. Some of the blood was his, but most of it belonged to the undead. Mash had torn through most of them, and black and red blood splotched on the ground around the beastmen. The black-furred beastman lay with his face in the dirt surrounded by a pool of red blood. His arms were scattered to his left and right, and his chest had been caved in slightly.

Luke rushed to him and began healing the man immediately. Mash half thought the person was dead, but slow rasping breaths made him think otherwise. The necromancer didn’t follow Luke to the beastman, instead turning to face Mash instead.

“You have done quite a lot of damage to the island.”

She spoke while staring at the odd, and probably dangerous metal trees. Mash sent Jill a message that it was safe to arrive while replying to the necromancer.

“It’s not my fault we didn’t get moved to a safe space to fight. I wonder why.”

Mash hadn’t really expected an answer, but the necromancer actually had one.

“It is because you are a monster, and you were fighting other monsters. When two undead fight, they will not be moved regardless of their level. The same is true between any of the non-human species.”

Mash was about to retort that it was different last time, but then he remembered he had been fighting a man. This meant that Mash would have to be extra careful when he eventually fought with a living dragon. Mash was focused on the necromancer’s reply and forgot to warn her about Jill’s arrival. Thus, when Jill teleported in, the necromancer attacked instinctively. The necromancer raised a hand glowing purple toward Jill. Mash grabbed the necromancer’s forearm to stop her. He only managed to slow her down. She was stronger than him! That surprised him.

Thankfully, the gesture was enough, and the necromancer’s hand stopped glowing. Jill spoke up from behind him as she arrived.

“I nearly died, didn’t I?”

Jill said the words jokingly, but a thin line of sweat slid down the side of her face. Her wing had come up to brace for the attack, but Mash wasn’t sure if that would work. Either way, he had stopped it. Mash told her roughly about what happened, and it only took a few moments to gather everyone and have Luke heal them.