Gilliam didn’t wait for the healing to complete, that would just be dumb, he intended to win. His head was wobbly from all the damage and he didn’t have enough knowledge about the brain or head trauma to properly mend it, so that would just have to be fixed passively. His body was getting better by the second.

Vozellath’s expression changed as Gilliam spawned another IceSpear and activated it, like before an ice-blue circle with hints of yellow tones blinked in and out of existence and had collapsed into the spear and already launched itself in a matter of a split second. The demon now knew what was going on and could dodge more accurately. This time he managed to not be where the spear was going, completely dodging it. At the same time, he seemed to have a realisation of his own before he did the same and spawned his magic circle which turned into the barrier.

Gilliam took a glance at it and saw that there was no change to the power of it than last time. Either this was a mana restriction or, since the Fracturians gain their powers based on eaten hearts it might be locked down to whatever the heart’s owner was capable of casting.

By now the demon had completely healed from the fist-sized hole in his side, its healing abilities were nothing short of impressive.

Gilliam mimicked the action and spawned a barrier, but he put a staggering amount of mana into it as well as putting it through the staff. A single rune came into the air with only a single circle around it, collapsing it washed over Gilliam almost as a water balloon before it faded away. He was satisfied that it kept the transparent nature he had learned earlier, much easier to use without negative side effects.

Vozellath seemed to panic and changed gears, reaching out towards Gilliam he said a few words Gilliam had never heard before, but he could still understand them; Ensnared by the shadows.

Gilliam didn’t recognize this spell, the multi-layered voice sounded like Vozellath’s own bassy one but it was mixed with another almost human-sounding one. Before Gilliam got to properly react he felt something grab his wrists.
Looking down he saw that pitch black, almost ink-like tentacles with hands on the end reached up from his own shadow and grabbed both his wrists as well as his ankles.

This was a problem, he needed a free hand to manifest the runes, and there were simple but intricate movements needed to direct the power. This was doubly true for Unstructured Magic. The strange part was that this entirely ignored his barrier, it was still up and untouched. The evidence was moving sand particles that hit against it and either slid off or were blown aside.

Vozellath seemed to have lost his smile and energy again pulsed from his body, this time it pulsed outwards and imploded back into him before his entire body started burning in an intense flame. Feeling more confident he walked towards Gilliam, not seeming to be in it for the joy anymore, having identified Gilliam as a threat.

Gilliam started panicking, trying to use the staff as the pointing and moving part but the grasping hands twisted his wrist to make him drop it. Attempting to activate the tattoo was also halted by the hand breaking his wrist in a swift motion.

Letting out a cry in pain the healing had already started mending this, but it meant that for at least a moment his hand was unusable, even for just activating the tattoo. He needed something, something to channel energy through. His hands were moved around erratically by the shadow hands so he couldn’t properly use that and he didn't dare just activate something random like one of the crystals through the ring as it might also blow up Savia. Had he felt confident he could have thrown it outside of his barrier he might have but like this, he didn’t feel confident in the slightest.

“That was almost dangerous.” Vozellath taunted as he came closer. “Had you hit me better then this might have turned out bad.” His smile grew back as he was now back on top.

Even at this distance, Gilliam could feel the heat, it seemed that radiant heat wasn’t something the barrier handled, or rather; looking around at debris and the instantly drying blood on the stones it was more that the barrier was working, just not completely.

Stepping in closer it was getting worse and worse, it seemed he was going to cook him, it felt like he was going to cook him. The solution was oddly simple, if he didn’t want to activate anything because of Savia, Savia just needed distance.

“Savia, get some distance I’m going to do something!” He shouted it in V’idan in the hopes that Vozellath hadn’t learned that.

Savia pulsed an agreeing feeling over their shared bond before she jumped out of his hair and took off away from them as fast as she could. She was tested to be quite fast back in Lisica so Gilliam didn’t wonder too hard about her getting away fast enough. Though there was some pain over their shared bond once she left the barrier, she seemed smart enough to try and use Gilliam to block most of it, he hated the situation more than before since she had to get hurt for this.

As she did that she built up energy in himself, though he couldn't direct his spell anywhere specific, nothing was stopping him from letting out a powerful pulse of energy.
Vozellath was first confused about the tiny creature that seemingly exited Gilliam’s head and flew off. However, he quickly changed focus once he noticed the building energy within his opponent.

Charging towards Gilliam claws ready for a strike Gilliam knew he had to wait as long as possible for maximum effect. The shadow hands broke his other wrist suddenly, which shattered his focus considerably. However this was not a spell in any form, it was just building up energy, and his focus wasn’t needed in the same way.

As Vozellath was only a few steps away, Gilliam let go of the energy he had been containing. A blinding light shone from his body for a split second before a powerful pulse of raw mana exited his body and tore anything in its path apart. This included anything that was not him specifically, his clothing was torn off his body, the ground under him was shredded and crushed, and most importantly; Vozellath looked like he was being hit by a wall of blades that was tearing him apart The ground was covered in chunks, gore and blood, the only thing that remained seemingly unhurt was the staff in the rubble and Gilliam himself. Though the staff looked quite dirty it was quite unharmed beside that.

A glance around had the now naked Gilliam pick up his staff, quick notice that though the cloak was also severely damaged it was mostly in one, very shredded, piece. He’d have to give it a mend later.

Not giving Vozellath any time to react, though he was shredded it was mostly surface damage and he was healing fast. This second was what Gilliam needed.

He started casting spell after spell, activating them as soon as they were ready but not cutting the feed to them. Adding a Stream rune to the mix, making a new rune word changed IceSpear into IceSpearStream. Though two runes it was much faster than the four to seven rune circles he had been using so far. The circle collapsed but pulsed back out and kept shooting ice spears. The first two missed, the third took care of the remainder of the barrier, and the others started contending with Vozellath’s regeneration.

Raising his tattered wings to fly away Gilliam acted quickly and cast a spell with the rune word for EarthGrasp. Activating it with a target on the demon had a simple tree-finger-looking hand extend up from the ground. Though it was simple in appearance it was strong, as soon as it came into contact with the demon it clamped in around his legs and exerted enough force to crush his bones, hooves and all.

Letting out a roar of pain he shouted the Force spell, which pulsed outwards and released his crushed legs as the hand was torn apart, the incoming spears shattered against the shockwave but there were more where that came from.

Within Gilliam’s mind something he had been wondering about for a while now snapped in properly. The spells he cast like this take the mana they need and produce the effect. He wasn't locked to one element anymore.

Pointing his hand towards his opponent he cast a spell, it had one very complex rune within its circle; TargetedChaos.

This spell ate up a tremendous amount of mana, even when using the staff and was to the point that he lost focus of the ice spear spell. The circle remained in the air for a solid two seconds as it amassed the energy needed. It was scintillating in all seven colours. Once it had enough energy it collapsed and pulsed into an incredibly angry-looking chaotic sphere of colors and energy. It disappeared towards the demon who was still healing from the ice sprears.

As the sphere connected with the demon Lord, there was a surprising lack of effect. The demon tried to swat it away, managing to hit it with his right hand. As the hand made contact the spell just disappeared from existence without any sound, light or pulse. However, it had taken with it a massive chunk of Vozellath’s right side. The sphere was flying towards him and a blink of the eyes later it was all gone, the sphere as well as half of his body.

The demon fell over, his mangled body no longer having the structural integrity to remain standing. Though that said his healing factor was doing its magic and slowly rebuilding him.

“I think not.” Gilliam commented as he took a few steps around some rubble to get a proper line of sight. He didn’t intend to give this up to chance or anything, he was handling this himself.

Casting a spell circle containing a single rune word of IceDisc he activated it towards the demon lord. It created and launched a sharp disc of magical air as expected, it slid through Vozellath’s hand which he tried to use to stop the spell, like it was a hot knife through butter his fingers were dismembered. Repeating the spell took his arm at the elbow, the next took his head. He kept casting it again and again until the demon more closely resembled chunks than a living being.

Casting a spell with the word for EnergyBlade collapsed and attached to his hand, spawning a seemingly two-dimensional short-sword-like object. He put the staff into the ring and used the new blade to carve his way through the demon’s chest. Being high on power, and adrenaline, the life or death situation had him completely lose his sense of thought as he had a single goal.
He carved his way through scales, skin, muscle, ribs and organs until he found the heart. Some of it was gone but that wasn’t an issue. He took a mighty bite into it and swallowed it.

At this moment his mind snapped back in and he realised what he was doing. Nausea kicked in hardcore and he felt like throwing up. Barely managing to stomach it he felt sick to his core. It didn’t help that he was entirely naked caked in both of their blood, gore and guts.

Dreading the need to eat the whole heart, as even the remains were the size of a decent watermelon he was very glad to see that it was disintegrating. Like the body, blood, gore and every single piece that remained of the demon lord it all started disintegrating into small, almost smoke-like particles. At the same time, he felt something different inside him, it was a warm and strange, but pleasant feeling. It was like having just consumed something warm and good on a cold day, running down and expanding within his body. It was vaguely building up within his body until it reached the point where it wanted out. This feeling came secondary as Gilliam had one thought, just one thing on his mind.

He had won.

Letting out the loudest and most powerful triumphant yell he could, infusing it with mana and the new feeling wanting out, the yell transformed into a magical pulse that expanded around him. As it hit the barrier it seemed to activate and started pulling away, like a bubble which got touched on one side in slow motion it was retracting. Moments later Angela and Petal came running over, arriving approximately at the same time they managed to get hold of Gilliam before he fell over.

Just as his legs were giving out he realised what was happening, all the fatigue, now that adrenaline and the heat-of-the-moment feeling were fading, it all hit him at once.

“We’re going to have a long talk when you wake up.” Angela smiled at him. He vaguely smiled before passing out.

Opening his eyes slowly he felt heavy. Looking around he was in an unfamiliar room, it was large and had a lot of weird bones, skulls and stuff around. He didn’t get to even sit up before he was hit in the face by a familiar tiny creature who, when peeled off his face, sported the widest and happiest smile physically possible on her tiny head.
She didn’t say anything but rather struggled free from his grasp and landed on his chest, sparrow-jumping over to his face she again embraced it the best she could.

Their shared bond was pulsing with nothing but true happiness and relief. She was worried but his waking up had amended that.

“How long was I out, where are we?” He asked Savia, too groggy to properly think on his own.

“Master is in big building!” She shouted back as she temporarily let go of his face to extend her wings as much as she could, emphasising the large nature of the building.

That kind of made sense, it was playing back in his mind, the fight and damage he took, it was a wonder that he survived and that his mana lasted as long as it did. Now that he won the building in the plaza was probably his. Though he had won the fight there was still much to do, changing their way of life would be a massive undertaking. But they should stop the portals into other worlds first and find out how to survive from that.

Getting out of the bed he first now realised just how large it was, his face grimaced as he realised this was probably Vozellath’s bed, and it was probably not exactly clean. His grimace changed into disgust as he made his way out of the bed as fast as he could. Though at his current weak state, this just had him tumble out of it onto the sandstone floor. It hurt but at least this time he didn’t break anything! The healing took care of the pain by the time he was on his feet, though still naked he was at least fine, everything was where it should be and save a few scars he seemed to not have healed fast enough he was actually in good shape.

Looking around again to get some more details, he saw that the skulls from before looked to be large animals... or other Fracturians... he didn’t know but they were big. There seemed to be a makeshift ‘bed’ of sorts on the floor, almost like slave bedding in the master’s room. That didn’t sit right with him but good thing that it was going away now.

Noticing his shredded cloak hanging over the bed, and that his ring was still on his finger, he took the moment to sit down next to it and mend it.
Taking the repair box out of the ring, as well as a fist-sized aether gem. Opening it it was easily explained by writings inside the box itself.

‘Put the crystal here’, ‘Put the coat on the circle’, and a note in the corner ‘Close the box, it will unlock when ready’.
It was signed by Skirnik, who was the crafter of this magnificent wonder of the world.

Before doing anything else Gilliam got some spare clothing out of the Ring, he wasn’t entirely comfortable with walking around naked in unfamiliar areas like these.
After he was clothed, and after Savia was back in her nest, he followed the instructions, and as he closed the box he heard a latch inside it slide in position and lock the box. It started radiating powerful magic moments later.

Gilliam sighed as he put the box on the bed. He was glad it was all over, at least the dangerous part, but he didn’t know if the Fracturians would accept him for what he was, and accept the new laws and rules.

A few seconds after sitting back to think the large door burst open, startling Gilliam enough that he instinctively pulled the staff out of the ring and cast a barrier on himself. It wasn’t until after that he realised it was Petal who had thrown herself at the door to get in faster.

“My Lord!” She shouted out with a happy expression as she darted over to embrace him.

He accepted the embrace and secretly thanked healing magic for not yelling out in pain when this happened. He was just feeling groggy and tired, if his wounds were still present he would most likely have gone unconscious from Savia’s hug and this would probably have killed him. Metaphorically speaking, naturally, however, he still loved the lack of pain from this.

Petal pushed herself away moments later. “I felt magic, what’s going on?!” As she asked this she suddenly stared at the box, seeming to have realised where the energy came from.
“What... what is it?” Having let go of Gilliam she was instinctively wary of the magic box on the bed.

“It is a special box that is repairing my coat.” He realised she might not have seen it before, so a simple explanation was probably the best.

“Oh... That’s good, then... I felt mana in here but didn’t know what it was.” She sat down on the bed next to him, slightly wary of the weird box still.
“Angela wants to talk to you when you’re ready.” She tilted her head onto his shoulder and wrapped her tail around him, almost as if she was afraid that he’d just run off.

“We can sit like this for a moment more.” Gilliam smiled, he said it mostly for his own sake. There was also that he wanted his cloak fixed before going outside. Just in case.

Petal didn’t respond but they sat like this for quite some time, simply relaxing and enjoying each other’s presence.

Suddenly the silence was interrupted by a click, even though it was a very low-volume sound it still startled Gilliam to the point where he felt the reaction to blow it up or fill it with holes. He managed to hold back but the fact that he felt this reaction... It felt like a side effect of being on guard this long, as well as that last fight...

Getting up he put on the cloak and did a cursory check. It seemed that the spells were still in the pockets, as were the mana crystals put in there, so he was back up and running. He was still missing the sword but he’ll ask for that later.

“Come, let’s go talk to Angela.” He smiled as he reached out his hand to Petal. They didn’t act too much like a couple before but now that he felt at least pseudo-relaxed for the first time in... He didn’t even know, it just felt better now that he was less on edge.

She reached out and took his hand, following him out of the room.

They entered into a much larger room, seeming to be directly connected to the massive doors that opened and let Vozellath out. Petal let go of the door and ran over to the doors with a large smile before she pulled a lever on the side that let a weight free which started opening the door.

Gilliam had to squint a lot as the sun made it in, he didn’t realize just how dark it was in here before but his squint turned to wide open eyes in surprise as the plaza outside looked entirely covered in Fracturians. They were of all shapes and sizes, and for the first time, he saw individuals from the slave caste mixed in with the rest.

Seeing this group was not what surprised him the most.

They cheered!