Tim’s Healing Bridge showed a timer at twenty-one minutes, meaning they had some work to do keeping this force back. He charged Warding into his gloved hand and held on while Murphy put the red neck in Getty up. Hooves glowing yellow in Donkey Fire kicked tufts of sand clouds in their trail.

  As he closed within two hundred yards of the castle tomb, the double doors at the front opened and folded in on the stone and skulls to expand to twenty feet high and wide. Inside was a view of an army raring back on the hind legs of their beefcakes with broken glass ricken. If the monsters carrying these riders chose to ditch the extra weight and charge with teeth and claws at the ready, Tim still would have felt the pressure like a mountain on his chest. As it stood, he had monsters and humanoid soldiers with swords riding high and roaring with a war cry.

  Tim decided Danger Sense and Cleanse would be a nice one-two punch to say hello while gaining a better eye on the threat. DS for the info, and Cleanse to slap them across the face for looking at him funny.

  He formed the two into a crossbolt and shot into the passageway.

  Without slowing Murphy down, he recalled Gregor’s riding advice and tried not to be so rigid with what the donkey was trying to do under him. This helped steady his hands while he took out the Hist venom to shave a sliver. Tim put the arrowhead in a notch on his bracer-crossbow slot and raised his knife blade to the ball of Venom, all with the rocking of Murphy’s gallop and hooves plodding the hard desert road.

  His bolt struck a rider, and the splash of blue and yellow waves illumined the troll riders and Chieftain Ulmont racing ahead of their battalion. Danger Sense counted fifty-five combo-rider groups. If they split and chose to fight alone, that meant one hundred ten against Tim’s less than ten. Their protective magic distorted his sense skill from gathering much more. He pressed in on his Cleanse spell to bury his aura under their armor, helping track them as they spread.

  There’s time to surprise him still.

  “Watch out for their Tide skill,” Lousa said over their Party comm. “We’re almost in range.”

  Dryfu floated in and helped assist the blade strokes while Tim carved a sliver of black ice. A flake peeled off as ridged and delicate as a flake of ice cream. The blackened foul makeup added a flare of Hell on Pointe to its texture, which Tim flicked onto his next arrow tip. Into this he cast White Fire, Spirit Trap, and Cleanse. The spells bubbled within the tar like Venom absorbing into the arrowhead. He turned the arrow upward to drain the excess onto the shaft. At the right time, he could release the timed spell and reflect the light off the silver tip.

  He'd have to get closer to cast Warding, but this ought to give him some time and space.

  With the way they deflected his last shot, Tim had to put some Peel on this. His MP was down to a third and burning hard. No doubt left, he cast the smallest amount of Peel into the stones in his glove. He formed Aura Bow and pulled back his arrow. Aiming Sniper Sight because he wasn’t taking any chances, he cast that and Mist into the arrow. Using his Danger Sense emanating on Ulmont’s armor, he locked green on the chieftain’s center mass and released the arrow. Peel speed enveloped the flung arrow in a flurry of near transparent void.

  Magnolia blue and yellow afterburn bloomed from his bow grip. A whoosh of air slapped him in the bow side of his face.

  Murphy snorted and hee-hawed a donkey form of, ‘you about done back there?’.

  A toot of glory erupted in flatulence strong enough it made him shift in his seat. The release granted Murphy’s extra 25% regen gains in void territory and void battles.

  Hot dog! Tim measured the increase in his MP and aura-health and guessed he had time for one more before they’d break into hand to hand with the riders.

  His arrow homed in on the final feet before Ulmont’s chest. Tim cast Mist into the narrow window. The chieftain’s eyes locked on the tail end as Mist faded its features. Tim snapped a finger to turn the arrow back into physical form with its head buried inside the chief’s armor.

  He coughed and his arms flew up. His reins fluttered and fell from his grip. The arrow tail fell off where the metal armor and Mist separated. A bright flash sent beams of White Fire through his sleeves and collar, doubling the punching impact already knocking the chief off his seat.

  His Exorcist class’s Hunting gains increased tracking of ricken and void creatures’ habits, as well as 25% more effective concoctions, which included his spell-enchanted arrow. This allowed Tim’s arrow to lead the roaring ugly beast to fall sidelong as the chief’s feet tripped its hind legs. Numbers like that filled his Exorcist skill sheet, including White Fire and Spirit Trap gaining an advantage of a 25% boost against venom enemies. His fleeing enjoyed the same, in case he needed to jet after he punched Ulmont in the nose. Maybe he’d Spirit Skin the traitor and teach his followers a lesson.

  Another beast carting a troll warrior stampeded the chief into ragdoll and blood splatter across the sand.

  Beams of Cleanse and Spirit Trap hit ricken and troll alike in an outward arc from Ulmont, slowing and diverting their motor functions and pulling some under in the immobilization. Troll and ricken cartwheeled into a nice spare for Tim’s first bowl.

  The horde spread out into the open desert in front of the castle, opening up the potential to flank Tim’s smaller group.

  “Nice shot!” Lousa shouted.

  Ulmont’s battered body held a few ounces of life still, but it wasn’t moving from the dust cloud they formed on their entry to the sands.

  Tim’s Danger Sense would keep a tag on him for movement. For now, he couldn’t track another shot.

  Murphy’s safe to leap frog them.

  K! Ready Murph?

  He brayed and Tim charged c-mana into the donkey’s legs and hooves.

  Wilqo and Frahnk lowered their heads and sped ahead toward targets about to wish they hadn’t been born. Tim cast Protection on both allies and hurled a Battleground ball on an arc toward their midpoint between the charging troll-ricken swarm.

  A troll warrior with a lion’s golden mane for a turban wrap and three slash marks across his muscle-built chest glowing with volcanic Venom raised an ocean shell to his lips and blew a gargling death cry loud enough to pinch Tim’s eardrums. The memory implanted it on his soul for hauntings untold in number. Bet.

  “That’s the tide!” Lousa called on the Party com. “Don’t let it reach your feet, or you’ll get sucked under.”

  The spell’s aura illumined from the ricken hooves along the front line. It pushed white water rapids into the sand with climbing height and speed.

  Tim slapped Murphy’s ass with a cast of Protection. “Get it, donkay!”

  Murphy yipped a holler do, then dipped into supercharged aura metal and leapt. Impacted sand crunched under his hooves and spring shot them into the wind.

  Yee-haw, Murph. Tim took a deep breath and blew his Wraith Whistle.

  Nivelador wraiths shimmered in and out with greater clarity as his spell met them in the air. Their occupation swirling around the middle of the pack tore them off track, tripping into or crashing in the invalid attempts to catch the hornet-angry spirits. Their essence burned of vengeance and fireworks, heated blades and flayed flesh.

  Murphy’s trajectory hit its peak and sank toward rapids guided by the second blow of the horn by the Golden Troll. His Tide swelled low then rose high and wide, threatening to clip Murphy’s hooves on the way over. These trolls had the power of the ocean on a whim and Tim’s MP was hurting. He couldn’t jump off, for it would push Murphy down into the white tips for sure.

  I got it, Dryfu said and flew out from Tim’s shirt and under Murphy. His added power lifted Tim and Murphy as the wave climbed toward them. Two splashes clapped and sprang high, extending for Murphy.

  Higher! Tim called.

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  Trying! Tornado power in Dryfu’s assist pushed them up and over the wave. Its splash at their feet turned them off kilter and falling backwards.

  Come on, Murph. Tim leaned forward and twisted to help the donkey right himself. He cast Battleground on a fastball.

  Murphy braced his front legs. His impact kicked the ground so hard it sank deep enough to bury a body. The Tide flushed backward into a wave tall enough to put Golden Troll and the next closest half dozen in their graves.

  The troll’s seashell howled into the wave’s vast underbelly, muffled and trapped along with the cries and failed escapes of his nearest friends.

  Murphy’s flex sprung them on a jet pack for the next pack of victims.

  Yee-haw!

  Wilqo flew up in an uppercut shot out of the earth. Sand, troll body parts and the glimmer of aura shone of his axe signaled a decent score from that side. Frahnk had himself in a circle of death, fending off trolls and ricken by himself. At least he had the Battleground to boost his knife slashes and fluid dodges. Still, they’d cut him, as evidenced by the blood leaking from his hip into darkened dabs of sand following his limp footed imprints.

  Murphy’s trajectory sent them to touchdown as trolls reared their ricken into full retreat. He pounced, dented the ground deep enough to shove off a wave climbing high and fast enough to carpet over two trolls and their rides.

  The sand settled and the trolls spun around, leaping in the whirlwind of power to arc toward Murphy mid-flight.

  Tim’s MP stores hovered around 30%. He didn’t like taking it farther than that on offensive spells, especially with the distance down to hand to hand, so he cast Battleground and a fresh coat of Protection on him and his friendlies.

  Dryfu zipped out in another Tornado attack.

  A troll winding a roped venom ball from a tether on his stick snapped his arm forward. The ball on the end swung at Tim. Too late to catch Dryfu, he resorted to cutting off the head using Rreyg’s Form.

  The venom ball clocked him right in the kitchen, of his head. The disruption to his Parry attempt cracked more than a few eggs off his shelf.

  Ya dig.

  Tim’s plans fell off along with the rim of the world as he shifted sandward on a broken axis. His helmet whistled, and not in a good way. He blew and the Wraith Whistle gave him a whole lot of nothin’ burbling out with bloody spit.

  His crash landed headward, pinching his neck and ringing another set of bells in the belfry. He hit the packed sand with the grace of a bag of wet leaves before bouncing to pleasant little after scratches and their skin removal policy.

  He skid to a stop and drew Farji with the heart of a lion. “I am the eye of the tiger—"

  A troll’s thrown blade spun a tight spiral at his face. Tim swung Farji to cut it off. The spinning blade bent around his thrust and skipped off his elbow. Excoriating pain ripped up and down his arm, numbing his handhold on Farji.

  Wraiths screeched in a torrent raining on the nearest trolls.

  The troll with a face like clawed hamburger strafed for a fissure in the sand while equipping another throwing blade.

  Tim’s Eye of the Tiger thrummed the muffled guitar intro while he tried healing his elbow. C-mana burned around the gash deep enough to expose bone and render his arm useless.

  Murphy moaned as he too tried to recover.

  A wraith shrieked on a flyby over Hamburger Troller, sending aura shock waves to punish him by eardrum into the fetal position.

  Tim took out some sausage links from his inventory and chucked two in his mouth. The other he smashed into his wound. He gritting his teeth as he shoved his bad shoulder into Murphy, heaving the donkey back to its feet.

  A ricken wildcat leapt out of another nearby fissure. Its claws shone on the prepping strike and its fangs pried back on the missile launch. Its face could have been John Candy from Spaceballs mixed with the crazy cat from Alice in Wonderland, spun in a blender of Saw and Predator and sausage factoried onto the assembly line to spit out Tim’s next opponent.

  Yay.

  Tim activated Dragon Heads and Ryukened a left handed fireball into the Candy Cat’s chest. Bladdow!

  His second charged Dragon Head emitted from his forward posture and Eye of the Tiger aura stream into overpowering the Venom driving the ricken.

  Its thrust reversed course midair and the Dragon Heads got to eat. A scorched rim expanded with orange flames licking away at its insides. Dragon Heads wiggling their amber tails like eels swimming into their prey.

  Hamburger Troller and a friend trolls charged from behind, curved blades shining with Venom enhancements.

  Tim shot single handed White Fire into Hamburgler’s sword grip. It blasted through flesh and metal to disarm the first. Tim’s elbow kicked with c-mana from his Survivor song and he blasted three more shots to their midsections. Despite fist sized freeways burned through armor like insta windows to their rearview, they kept on. Tim used the back steps to heft himself onto Murph’s back. Donkey Kick!

  Hamburgler slashed a wide arcing knife attack with his sole hand.

  At a thought, Tim directed Murph to hoof him in the elbow, popping a joint and sending a shiver of weakness up into his fingers. He lost his knife. Tim equipped Farji and sliced it clean through the troll’s neck. On the exit, the second troll thrashed his sword, and Tim dropped his blade low, catching metal on metal before it could clip him or Murphy. Tim had the inside angle and stabbed Farji into the second troll’s chest.

  Green blood spewed and expelled Venom in a mouthful of its acrid odor. Tim cast Draw to his sword and absorbed the escaping aura. MP refilled and he cast White Fire point blank into a face no troll mother could love. His snarling skeletor nostrils and rage filled eyes evaporated in white light. The hole borrowed through his skull formed a valley with crumbling avalanches of melting brain and tufts of hair broiling into curls of smoke and sinking ash.

  Murphy’s Donk Kick collided with a new troll’s midsection, T-boning him sideways. A crack sounded from its leg and a compound fracture sprayed more ectoplasm across the sand. The troll’s reach extended toward Murphy’s hind leg and slashed at his ankles. The blade carved through Tim’s spells and slit open a bloody red gash deep enough to expose white bone.

  Murphy yelped and dipped forward to relieve the weight from that leg. His angle cast Tim outside the reach of a sword strike on the troll rolling away.

  Ahead, trolls charged on rickenback, half a dozen on the front line of more, seizing their opportunity in his awkward fall.

  Murphy trotted further off balance from front legs and a single hind one he used to kick the ground. A shudder shook the ricken on their leap, bouncing them off kilter.

  Tim sliced Farji across the tilting horizon, cutting into a few targets on his way down.

  A hole opened in a geyser of rock exploding into the crowd while caving in under Tim and Murphy. Wilqo’s essence rose in a fivel Uppercut fanning wide enough to push their wave backward.

  Tim and Murphy rolled down the slope into a wall ending this route of Wilqo’s tunnel. Tim ingested a quick snack of sausage links and cast Healing Bridge from Murphy’s ankle to his head and up toward Wilqo.

  He landed on the other side of his launch ramp, fueled by Tim’s healing and ready to cut a troll or two with his free-swinging battle axe.

  Danger Sense warnings lit up in Tim’s HUD, and he swiped them open. Ulmont’s rise to his feet and path heading toward Wilqo topped the list. His Healing Bridge to the Cabir Gate still had fourteen minutes. Every spell he cast extended that timeline.

  Meanwhile, reinforcements of ricken riding trolls streamed through the tomb doorway to the battlefield. His permeating Danger Sense sent readings of wounded wraiths and a swell in the battle tide favoring the enemy.

  Some split to follow a hall in the tomb leading below. His cast on the structure returned a passageway rimmed with the nivelador wraiths’ essence. Wraith One specifically, most recently. What was he doing down there? Tim gathered Danger Sense into that area and set it on the hunt to make sure he was okay. Only six wraiths remained outside the tomb, split between attacking the horde breaking through and addressing a leak of aura from the castle’s vibrating “headphones.”

  Wilqo diving into the hole with Tim interrupted his examination. The fivel commander had a gash from throat to thigh bone. He leaked hot blood and stinking insides onto Tim as he prepped to catch him.

  Tim cast Healing through burning hands and fell backward as he caught Wilqo, absorbing some of the impact.

  “Cover fire on the chief! Wilqo’s down!” Tim called into the Party channel. Aura fatigue rippled across his flesh like a cold fever. “I need to recharge. They’ve split to enter the tomb.”

  He spent precious mana on a Spirit Memory into the Party Oversight so they could see the doors at the stairs leading down into the tomb. The location of the treasure. His Danger Sense spread over Veriki’s tracks. She had gone there since Tim showed. Along with Hixel Mur. Spirit Memories revealed a plan to get to the treasure while the wraith guardians were occupied outside.

  White Man’s Tears drew out a faint thought from Wraith One, who was the first to challenge them.

  He faded under a Venom spell, thinking, How did they know?

  “Chane.” The name spoke from Veriki’s memories. The leader of the cartel in Wachamia sent Veriki to the tomb with a mission: if they failed to retrieve Teo’s Skull, there were other items worth stealing. Tim failed to recall any more intel.

  Danger Sense tracked them halfway to the epicenter of the tomb’s storage and faded.

  A shadow darkened the light from outside Tim’s hole. Ulmont’s spell roiled in as blackened smoke, already burning Tim’s nostrils and lungs. The counter spell halted his c-mana production and weakened his healing spells with Wilqo and Murphy still bleeding.

  The smoke thickened into an eruption of water and an avalanche roared on its downward crash toward Tim. Despite his Protection spell, the swell forced him and his friends into an abrasive exit the other way, flushed like turds for the sewer.

  Tim held his breath and closed his eyes against the filth swirling in the opaque water. The tide took him back toward the start of Wilqo’s tunnel. Tim didn’t want to risk waiting or getting trapped, so he equipped his knife and pickaxe and dragged them against the walls.

  The water pushed him hard, surging and throwing him into bare rock before being tumble rolled by the tide. He stuck the blades out again and stabbed them deep into the rock. No ability to cast spells like Mist, but if he drowned to 30% health, he would auto transform into Aura Form, then escape and take it to the chief face to aura face.

  All he had to do was nearly drown.

  His pickaxe hooked into a divot and clawed inward for dear life. Unfortunately, his gotr blade dagger bucked back and he lost his grip. The dagger flowed free. He tried pulling the axe but it was stuck. The daggers essence faded from his view as the edges of his vision grayed. His lungs burned with an overindulgence of Venom rich swamp water, choking him with bursts that broke his final barrier.

  The steep decline into death carried him with the speed of an avalanche.

  Josim emerged into the narrowing tunnel of light. A whisp of friction brushed Tim’s cheek in fading strength; whether it was a goodbye or a rescue he couldn’t tell.

  Only darkness pinching life shut with overwhelming force.

  Careful! Dryfu shouted from a thousand miles away.