Savage Awakening 256. Third Floor's End (IV) (Patreon)

Zane explained what he was thinking. He got lots of nods. 

“We’re right behind you,” Reina assured him. 

“Mhm!” said Evan.

“You’ve got this big fella!” cheered Avery. 

It was nice to see. He hadn’t done so well so far this fight. But he could feel how much belief they had in him. That had not gone at all—it warmed him to see. And that feeling gave him a little extra strength.

He supposed they had been through this kind of thing a lot before. He had yet to let them down.

He would not start now.

They all turned to face the Monster again.

Its wounds had mostly healed. And though its domain wasn't as strong as it was at the start—it was plenty enough to finish the job.

Zane, meanwhile, was still pretty badly shattered. With Reina’s help, he'd made up a little healing. Crept back over 25%, if barely. His essence tank had gone down to less than half. It was about to be a lot less than even that.

His friends weren't in much better shape, firepower-wise. They were all pushing through though—he saw three determined faces.

One last effort.

The Beast’s eyes gleamed. It was nearly back to ready, just as they were.

It was time.

Zane changed out his weapons. 

And called forth a power deep in his body. A vast untapped wellspring—the single greatest attack left to him… 

His hammers erupted in air. Began gathering essence at a shocking speed, flaring bright, new stars rising over a bleak land. 

Twin wishes coming to life.

The creature looked to Zane now curiously. Its head was cocked farther than its neck should have allowed. It did not understand.

It could see that Zane was gathering an impressive power. A realm-shaking power even—a power that, should it hit, would cause catastrophic damage. Even to it. 

But there was the same issue that plagued Zane all this time. 

Zane had been one big blundering force. A show of great might—going nowhere. 

It was wondering if Zane really thought he could hit it.

It was wondering if Zane was merely desperate. Or if his mind had shattered under all that damage… 

It stopped caring. 

Its claws unsheathed—

And it lunged for Zane’s head. Streaks of spittle flying from its open leering mouth, domain flaring to life, making its every step count double, until it sped across the land, impossibly fast, as though riding its own little wormhole— 

It would finish him off before he could get the shot off.

Reina rushed to block. Let out a brave cry. A shield flared up, as strong as she could muster. 

Not strong enough. 

Those claws smoked frost, leaked a black ice whose bite shredded harder than any mere bone or steel—a bite borne of sheer cold, a bite that killed, froze dead all it touched, even as it shredded… the highest form of Frostbite. 

You could see the essence in Reina’s shield deadening the instant it touched. Blowing out, cracking down its length—

She knew she was all that protected him now, as he charged up in this critical state. It somehow gave her an extra strength. She cried out—and held under the blow… 

The next claw shattered it. Reina went down gasping, coughing blood. 

Zane had to grit his teeth even as rage spiked in his chest. He could not afford to lose focus.

He forced his mind on the gathering flame. Halfway lit now, rising higher and higher… 

Life and death hung on these next few seconds. 

Evan shouted too, and a light-beam blasted forth. But the Monster ducked it with ease. 

And then Zane stood there before it. Bare. 

It tore into him with relish. Slammed him with a whirlwind of claws, each more brutal than the last, cutting deeper than the last, shredding through already-ruined skin to get at the richer stuff, the vital stuff, the still-beating, still-burning parts of him— 

Warning! 

Health under 25%

Those claws menaced his face, his chest. Wherever they went, they found reams of hardened muscle. But Zane was softening fast, wilting—he was running out of flesh to be cut, even as he struggled to hold those hammers aloft…

He just took it. Even as his health dipped dangerously close to Critical, as gaping black maws blotted out his sight, as claws ripped so deep he could feel the cold slicing into his heart—

He started sagging. His legs, buckling under his weight. Under the weight of all those blows. He let out a grunt. 

Everything was going bleary, going numb…

The beast could tell it was getting close. At last he was going down—it struck with renewed ferocity over and over, its grin only widening—

“Hang in there big fella!” cried Avery off to the side. She really wanted to jump in—she knew she couldn't.

Zane had to face this trial alone. Tough out these last few moments, before—

A shockwave in the Astral Plane. An eruption of fierce light. Of a heat-wave so intense it blasted out like a thunderclap, making great warbling circles in air, washing out to the distant horizons… and the world was cast not in frostbite black. But Stormfire purple. 

Zane’s power. Come to life at last. 

The Monster paused. Looked up. Squinted at the sight, frowning… 

Its time was up.

He still stood. Teetering on the very brink of Critical Health—but still there. 

Still heaving in deep, rattling breaths—big heart still fighting furiously against all that encroaching cold, even as his big body failed limb by limb. 

Zane bellowed. A hoarse, bloody, wheezing sound—but just as fierce as ever.

And with all he had left, he tore his stars down from the sky.

The Monster looked at them nearly with contempt. 

It flickered away, bleak winds wrapping around it, domain flaring—and yet again space seemed to bend around it as it moved, wrapped in its own little world—ready to skirt the blasts entirely. 

A dumber beast might have kept clawing at Zane, and paid the awful price. But it still respected that power. It knew that even on the brink of death, certain creatures—especially the mighty ones—were still very dangerous. 

But they also both knew, in that moment, Zane was not going to be able to land the killing blow.

All he could hope to do was to catch it in the blast radius. 

And his blast would be blunted by that domain. It would not nearly enough to do the damage he needed… 

It was all playing out before his bleary eyes. Seemingly in slow-motion. The Monster speeding away even as his stars bent low. 

It was why he had thrown away this idea. At first.

His stars kept going. Streaking far across the sky… splitting up. Going opposite ways. 

Neither going for the Monster. 

One hammer shot off into the distance—out left. The other, making for the rightward horizon. Far behind the Monster.

It took the creature a second to understand what was going on.

First it looked at Zane with mirth. There was a smugness to its shiny toothy smile. Like it thought it had broken Zane so thoroughly he couldn't even aim straight anymore. 

That was a precious second wasted.

Then its eyes slowly widened. Taking in its positioning.

One hammer straying far left. Behind. The other far right. Behind. And Zane up in the very front… 

It was stuck in the center of a triangle. And once those blasts went off—once those shock waves swept through, those massive forces shifting heaven and earth—

They would all head in one direction.

It locked eyes with Zane. Saw the Chains clamped tight in his bloody fists.

For the first time the smile wobbled on its face.

It ran. Dashed away at blistering pace—trying to get out of this deadly triangle, just trying to put as much distance as it could—slip out of the blast radius if it could—

It got a fair ways.

Then the stars went off. 

And the blasts came crashing straight for it. It shrieked. 

Walls of blinding purple lighting up the world, flooding the horizon end to end, burgeoning fast. Closing in with a furious roar, walls of immense force and energy and heat melting all they touched, blasting vast waves of pure force straight in Zane's direction—

But it was looking like the Monster had got out in time. It was still moving at blinding speeds—it was looking like it just might clear the edge of that leftmost wall… 

Then Avery showed what she had been saving her strength for. 

“No you don’t!” she cried. 

The Stormfire curved. Deflected off an invisible bubble, swerving off path to cut the Monster right off. 

There was no escape. No time to even shriek.

Zane’s blasts landed like hammer-blows. 

And it went flying. Like it had been shot out of a cannon—swamped in searing Stormfire, clawing at the air, trying desperately to stabilize, flipping head over heels, trying to make use of its domain, its greatest advantage—but it was caught in a wave whose sheer magnitude was impossible to resist. A wave crashing back to shore…

Crashing right toward Zane.

Avery keeled over to the side of him, a little fried. But she had done enough.

Evan hurled one more blast just when the Monster was flexing its domain, trying to slow things down—just when it looked like it might right itself. He smashed one light-beam straight down its face—it went careening again, flailing madly…

Zane crouched. Clenched his fists around his Chains. Heaved in one deep breath.

And lunged. 

Then it was two halves of Zane blasting toward each other. His Stormfire meeting his body—crushing right down the middle. 

And Zane at last clamped one big fist around the beast’s soft throat.

It choked. 

Instantly it started thrashing, clawing, biting— Zane felt his hand numbing, joints crackling, going black, flaring in icy pain—but his heart had never pumped so powerfully either, rushing hot vital blood to his fingers. Even as claw after claw shredded up his arm beyond recognition, shredding the last of his muscles, deadening almost all of it—

Warning!

Critical Health

Zane's grip could have been cast in iron. 

He refused to let go.

The Monster shrieked.

Then Zane’s Chain looped around its throat, locking tight. And it choked.

Another Chain swung heavy around its arms, a third clamped its legs, its waist—and it was well and truly stuck then.

For the first time that fight, their positions had reversed.

Now it was the helpless one. 

The Monster tried scrambling out, tried kicking and wriggling—but it ran up against a wall of sheer strength, of raw power. A level of physicality it could not hope to match. Its powers were bound utterly.

Its eyes bulged, cracking red as it looked to Zane again. And Zane made one last change.

His hammers dropped off. His Chains went back to base form.

And lit up end-to-end with all the Stormfire he could muster. Searing the Monster throat-to-shin— 

Prometheus Noose! 

Its eyes bulged so big it looked like they were about to shoot out of its skull—it opened its mouth but no sound leaked out. There was a smoking, a crackling of flesh burning—slowly at first as fiery Laws warred against cold ones, faster and faster as the Skill took hold, just kept tightening, flaring as Zane clamped harder and harder—at last giving his muscles something to bear down upon…

The Monster was right, it was quickly finding out. Even on his last legs there was enough power in Zane’s fingers alone to kill a Nascent Soul. Much less his whole body.

He raised his fists. Saw their growing shadows looming over its quickly purpling face as it flailed for all it was worth, mouth hanging open in soundless toothless shrieks— 

Zane let out a triumphant roar. And did what he did best. 

Smash.