RAAAWWWR!
The sound that Jin's body made as it smashed into the tree penetrated the open spaces. A sound which broke the brave feeling among the group. He lay motionless on the ground. His best fighter was out with one hit.
Cold terror and strong keep that wanting into all of them. Derek's team was as good as one such efficient working group assigned to kill. Their skills make perfect traps of curses-gravity areas-and very realistic fakes. They weren't just fighting them; they mentally broke them into smaller parts.
Dante's mind went fast. It cut through the fear with cold exact thinking. 'A straight fight will kill us. They are perfect tools. You do not fight a tool. You put something in to stop the parts.'
"Eric!" Dante yelled exclaiming loudly. Help was just by word of mouth in the heat of battle. "Do not think about blocking! Use all your power for Shield Bash! Make Derek lose his balance right now!"
The kind of command that might get him killed. Letting his guard down for even a moment would get him killed. But Eric had not waited.
He ran forward, pouring all his strength into his shield with a deep loud sound, white-blinding light hurt the eyes. He did not stop Derek's next swing. He put his whole body into the bigger man.
BOOM!
The hit was like a loud thunder crash.
Completely unprepared for this, the sound that escaped Derek's mouth was drowned out as he went flying into the air. His greatsword went much wider. That was just two seconds, but that was all they needed.
"Talia!" Dante shouted very loud as kings, Monarch of Ancients-accompians of each-knew so well. "The one with gravity! Do it now!"
She had sweat on her face from the hard job and still had to keep her face a stern guise.
But her Kinetic Eye was still on. In the short mess, she saw her way. She did not try to beat the spell. She went along with it.
With all her strength, she pushed hard off the ground. She used the fake gravity to send herself forward in a low turn. Her foil was led by her seeing ahead. It was not to kill.
SHNK!
It dug deep into the Graviton user's leg. The mage screamed out. His attention broke. The heavy feel on Talia and on Jin, who was far and down, went away right then. The spell finished.
"Masha, do not try to find the real one with fake things!" Dante told her. "Cover all the back part! Use Absolute Zero now!"
It was the kind of order spiced up with necessity. Masha had, in fact, tried to fight fake pictures of Derek. She bit her teeth, and she did just as he had said.
She stopped trying to point at one. She pushed her hands out and sent her power not as an aimed hit. She sent it as a wild big wave of cold.
Within moments, the air froze.
A storm of sharp ice bits came out. It cut the enemy's backline. The fake things grew dim and disappeared as the Phantasm user fell down, making high-pitched sounds.
The curse user who had been taking from Erica had to stop his spell to not get cut up.
The grounds where the fight was going had now turned into a very messy set. They were no longer one as a team.
He turned to their healer who was trying hard to make Eric stay standing: "Rina!" yelled Dante. "Stop fixing! The boy with the snake mark, the one with poison! Use your life magic on the ground under him!"
"What?" she said loud. She did not get it.
"He uses Toximancy! His power comes from things falling apart! Change it! Use your life magic on the plants! Make it too much for him!"
And she understood. Her eyes betrayed her that she did. This was a very wild, good way to use what she could do. She slapped her hands on the forest ground. Not to fix but to give.
Snakes of bright green lit her palms. They pulsed to beat and put live with dirt. Mosses quickly grew big around the poison ones and the one keeping him safe, vines, and roots.
Thick, pointed vines came up from the ground, influxed around their legs and arms to box them in with rapidly growing life. The Toximancy user got his magic from bad, and was now getting stuck in-the thing that was the other way.
"Erica!" yelled Dante. His voice was painfully sore. "You are not held! Burn him to nothing!"
Erica whipped her gaze up. The taking curse had been presumably gone. Her eyes were ablaze with anger and ill will, looking at the pinned poison one. 'You made me no use,' she thought, her maddened feeling like an angry fire. 'You made me just look.'
All her fear and bad thoughts came together into one dense point of hot hate.
She put her hands together. The air between them got tight and started to burn, like a bright spear of pure hot stuff.
"Go away," she said low.
Through her hands pushed together, a bright spear blasted into the open space. Wardcraft user still tried to build a wall with the vines, but it was too late.
The hot spear hit the trapped Toximancy user directly in his chest.
No big bang. Just a hush of white light for everything. The boy didn't have time to make a sound.
His body, the vines, and a part of the ground around him turned to air right away. It left just a hole with smoke and hard glass.
Gone.
The impact in their minds was worth as much as a hit. The enemy team was put on halt. Their eyes popped wide open in fear.
Derek's lips were tight with rage. He roared his battle-cry. "You will pay that!" He did not even glance at Eric but lunged towards Jin, who was recovering. His greatsword was up for a kill hit.
But Talia was there already. With no gravity spell, she was like a shadow. Her foil was a silver fast move. She hit not at Derek, but at the fighters who tried to help him. She cut the leg of one and took the weapon from another.
As Derek's blade came down, Eric stopped it. His shield hit the greatsword with sparks. He was not just blocking now. He was in the fight.
The mess reached its top. Masha's storm continues. Magic is levied over enemy ones. The team was not without injury, but fought with mind hard as one.
And right in that, Dante finally had what he needed-a new dead body.
He stepped out from the rock that had been his place to tell what to do. He held a hand out to the hole with smoke where the Toximancy user died.
He could feel what was left of it. Its mark in the world. He pulled on that mark with all he had. He put his cold power that wanted things into it.
"Get up," he told it.
From the sides of the hole, dark things started to come as one. Dust, burned stuff, and black dirt moved in a circle. Pulled by a force no one saw.
The shape of a person started to come. A dark outline made of full black and hate. It got hard into a full dark copy of the dead Toximancy user.
Its eyes opened. They had the same purple light that was not right like the goblins he made before.
The ones left in Derek's team stopped. Their blood felt cold.
The Wardcraft user had just got free from the last vines. He looked with full fear as the dark copy of his dead friend turned to him.
The fight was not done. But their good way of breaking things was gone.
And now, they would face the bad cry of their own dead friend. Led by him.