Chapter 536 - 536: Pushing through

The monster's body hit the ground, and the glow drifted out of it and sank into Dawn's chest.

She felt it spread through her arms and legs, warm and heavy. Her breathing steadied for a moment, and her grip tightened on the sword. It was not a rush of strength. It was more like someone had poured fuel on a fire that was already burning.

'More. I need more.'

"Dawn, left!" Gallan shouted.

She turned. Three smaller monsters were scrambling over the rubble toward them, all arms and teeth. Gallan was already moving. He swung both blades in a wide cross, and a pair of wind arcs tore across the field and cut the first two in half. The third leaped past the arcs.

Fang hit it in mid-air.

CRACK!

Lightning wrapped around his body as he slammed into it, and the monster dropped on the ground in a smoking heap.

"We keep moving," Dawn said, looking past them.

The ruined town sat ahead, its broken walls rising out of the weeds. Beyond the gap in the stone, she could see it. A rift hung in the air above the old market square, jagged and violet, still spilling monsters into the streets.

"That's the source," Gallan said. "We destroy that, and we get the thousand points."

"Then we go through them," Dawn said.

They charged.

The field between them and the wall was full of monsters. They came in clusters from every side, crawling out of the grass and dropping off the broken stones. Gallan led the way, cutting a path with arcs of wind that opened the crowd like a blade through cloth. Fang ran at his flank, shocking everything that got close.

Dawn stayed in the middle.

She was not thinking about the points. She was not thinking about the others. Her mind had narrowed to a single line, and everything on it was in front of her sword. She cut down a monster, and the glow rushed in. She cut down another, and she felt her legs get lighter. Every kill made her faster, and every kill made her hungrier.

'Keep going. Don't stop. If I stop, I'm back where I was.'

She leaped over a clawing arm and slashed it off at the shoulder. She spun and drove her blade through a chest, and flames burst from the wound. Sweat ran down her face and her breath burned in her throat, but she pushed harder, and the harder she pushed, the more the divine energy seemed to answer.

"Dawn, slow down!" Gallan yelled, blocking a swipe. "You're getting ahead of us!"

"I'm fine!"

They reached the wall and broke through a gap in the stone. The market square opened in front of them, and the rift loomed overhead, pulsing like a wound in the sky.

Then the monsters at the center parted.

Something stepped out of the rift.

It stood on two legs, but they were not the legs of a man. They were thin and bent in the middle, the legs of an insect. Its waist was slim, almost too narrow to hold up its body, and its chest was armored in dark plates. Its head was long, with three sharp points crowning the top of it. Six eyes sat in a ring around its face.

Its arms were like those of a praying mantis, long and folded, with serrated blades along the inner edge.

All six eyes locked onto Dawn.

"Dawn, get back!" Gallan shouted.

She raised her sword.

The monster vanished.

She did not even see it move. One moment it was standing at the center of the square, and the next it was in front of her, and its arm was already swinging. The blade hit her sword and drove her back across the ground. Before she could recover, its other arm slammed into her chest.

BAM!

She flew backward through the air and crashed into a stone wall, far from the others.

"Dawn!" Gallan yelled.

He started toward her, and the monster's shadow passed over him. Another one dropped from the rift and blocked his path. Fang was pinned on the other side by a pack that had been waiting. The three of them were split apart in a heartbeat.

Dawn pushed herself off the wall, her ribs screaming.

The monster was already there.

It came at her in a blur, both arms swinging. She raised her sword and blocked the first strike, then the second, then the third. Each one felt like being hit by a falling beam. Her arms shook. The blades came faster, and she could not see the next one before it landed.

CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!

A cut opened across her shoulder. Another sliced her thigh. She twisted, dodged one, and took the next across the back. She gritted her teeth and swung back, but the monster simply tilted its head and the blade passed through empty air.

'It's Too fast. I can't even touch it.'

Fire flared along her sword, and she slashed in a wide arc. The monster leaped over it on its thin legs and came down behind her. Its blades dug into her armor, and she barely rolled out of the way.

She spat blood and got to her feet.

'Think. Think! Where is its opening? There has to be one somewhere '

There was none. Every time she thought she saw one, it closed before she moved. The monster pressed forward, step by step, never giving her room to breathe. Its six eyes stared at her without blinking.

She kept her sword up and kept moving. She was not winning. She was only staying alive.

The monster stopped.

It stepped back, drew both arms wide, and its blades began to gleam.

Dawn saw it coming. She raised her sword across her body with both hands, flames roaring along its length, and braced her feet.

The monster swung.

It was a double slash, both blades crossing in a single massive strike. She blocked it, and the force went through her like a blast of thunder. The ground cracked under her feet, and she was thrown backward.

She smashed through a wall. Then another. Then a road, and a cart, and the front of a house, a spray of stone and dust following her through the town, until finally she drove her sword into the ground and dug in.

SCREEEECH!

She skidded to a stop, kneeling on one leg, her hands wrapped around the hilt.

She coughed, and blood spattered across the dirt in front of her.