“You think our lives on the same level as yours, goblin!?” said Erik. He grinned broadly, his animalistic canines jutting out as his expression twisted with battle hunger and rage known wide among Fjall and its human natives. He powered up with golden mana purely geared towards offense, his massive muscles bulging in flexion as he empowered his body with magical energy. “You will come to know your folly!”

“Erik, wait-,” began Arav.

“Break through and run,” said Erik more quietly. “I will hold them.”

Arav understood then. Erik was sacrificing his life so that the others could escape. A noble, honorable thing to do, doing the name of the Fjallan warriors and their adherence to the nobility of battle more than enough justice.

And Arav was not going to hesitate and waste it.

.

“Move, move!” said Arav as he pointed forwards, towards the two champions ahead of them. “Spear formation – pierce through!”

Arav sprinted ahead of all of his team to act as a siege breaker to overwhelm the two champions with sudden power. Federic would then slam into them and use his metal magic to suppress then. All the while, Yua and Ais would use suppressive fire to prevent the champions from retaliating.

“[Forest Strength], [Woodland Speed], [Wild Frenzy],” said Ais in the language of the gods, channeling her circuits and flowing magical energy into Arav in the form of enhancements that boosted his physical power, his agility, and his pain tolerance.

Arav landed between the two champions, and they withdrew gleaming blades of crystallized light from leather sheaths at their waists. He dodged under one swing and then slammed Bloodspike into one of the champions, knocking it away several meters with heavy impact.

Bloodspike was not only a projectile weapon. Its fluxing, malleable muscle structure could become rigid and act as a bludgeoning weapon depending on how Arav put his mana into it.

The champion guarded the strike at the last moment, so it would not do much more than bruise his arm. But this gave Arav time to deal with the second champion. He flattened Bloodspike’s structure into that of a large blade and sliced at the champion’s head.

The champion clashed with Arav with his lightblade, holding the two together in a sword lock. However, Arav had no time to be in a lock of any kind. He surged his red mana to his limits, empowering his body explosively to overpower the champion.

The champion surged his own red mana, countering Arav’s explosive mana with his own.

Annoying. A fight between two individuals with chaos mana was about finding the right timing to use one’s explosive burst of power or forcing a burst out from an enemy without using one’s own. But in an equally matched lock like this, both parties just wasted time and mana.

The champion even slowly started to overpower Arav, placing both his hands on his blade to exert as much force as possible whereas Arav could only use one arm’s worth of force for Bloodspike as it was not a weapon with any handle to leverage another grip off of.

But that was the champion’s mistake.

Arav manifested his Arcana: the Bluefire Blade.

On his empty left hand, bright blue flames sputtered out, curling around into the shape of a lengthy blade of solidified, superheated energy. He slashed upwards with the blade, easily searing through one of the champion’s arms, severing it.

The champion grunted in pain, and Arav kicked the champion with his buffed stats, sending the oversized goblin hurtling backwards.

Now, one more remaining.

The other champion roared as he stabbed in his glowing golden blade at Arav’s back, but he flipped in the air to dodge. Federic took his spot, slamming the champion with a shield bash, and the goblin skidded back a few meters before easily beginning to overpower Federic, putting his icy white hands onto Federic’s greatshield and crumpling the metal with his grip strength alone.

Golden mana geared for offense raged around this goblin, and he used it now to convincingly beat back Federic, a giant of a man whose strength was enhanced fivefold by his armor. But even Metallo coresmithing and their famed power armor that imparted the strength of monsters into their wearers was not enough to best this goblin.

Several flaming arrows homed across Federic, spinning and changing their trajectories to hit the goblin champion in the neck and chest with a few arrows aimed at the eyes dodged at the last moment. The other arrows pierced deep, forcing the goblin to divert his mana from power into defensively guarding his muscles to prevent them from skewering his vitals.

This gave Federic a brief reprieve to shout and push back, shoving the goblin champion a small distance away. Federic crumpled to one knee, his armor clanging with the heavy moment, and his breaths were labored.

“[Entanglement]” said Ais as she pointed her palms towards the champion. From the ground, roots wreathed in green flow mana sprouted outwards, tangling around the champion’s limbs and trying to pull him back to the ground in an imprisoning bind.

The champion resisted this too with his prodigious strength, tearing the roots from the earth, but Arav took this moment to slash at the champion’s legs with his Bluefire Blade, severing tendons at the ankles necessary for any movement.

This made the champion buckle forwards, crashing face first into the ground.

“Now! Up the hill!” said Arav as he sprinted forwards. He heard his team’s footsteps trail right behind him, passing by the goblins.

“Federic, steps!” said Arav.

Federic pointed his mace at the face of the sheer, rocky face of the hill, and his arms crackled with grey energy as his greyed circuits flared, showing connection to the god Ilmar. He fired off a bolt of grey energy into the hill face, and it ran up its length, creating metallic steps from the rock.

Arav began to scale up the hill, leaping from step to step with expert agility