Elma's yell echoed, but there were no signs of movement from the forest Dorthaunzee was launched toward.

"We'll swing around and rescue her, Lass!" Goff yelled as he kept carrying Elma.

Gwenybell's cry reached their ears from dozens of feet away. "Something's happening! Be careful!"

Elma focused on the malefic tortoise and noticed that roots had grown from its feet and were tethering it to the ground.

Elma raised a brow, perplexed. "It's anchoring itself to the ground." She looked up at the snake. "It's still. It's just looking at us..."

"The earth is dying!" Gwenybell screamed as she dropped her crossbow and started shooting arrows at the malefic tortoise.

"What the? What's going on?" Elma asked herself.

Then, she saw a trickle of light slipping out from the shell's opening. Her eyes went wide as she realized what was coming.

"It's aiming at us! Sir! It's about to fire something!"

"What now--"

Goff had no time to react as the light went from trickling to surging in a split second. A terrifying and pillar-like purple beam shot out from the tortoise's open mouth, scorching the ground as it traveled toward Elma and Goff.

Nixim, standing once more and with blood pouring from her mouth, screamed. "Goff! Jump to your left!" Magic left her staff as she spoke and flew behind Goff, where it expanded into a Holy Magic Array--one that acted as a sort of upgraded shield.

The beam hit the array, its heat still reaching Elma. Goff noted the pressure and quickly turned 90 degrees to the left. The beam shattered the array and flew--

"It broke through!" Nixim screamed. "Curse it all!"

Goff rolled out of the way, viciously hitting the ground while tucking Elma closer to his body. The beam missed him by a foot, but the heat burned his back.

"We're okay, Lass!" he said, fighting through the pain.

"Thank you!"

"NOOOO!"

Elma and Goff looked up at the person who screamed at them from their spot on the ground.

"No! The village!" Gwenybell continued to scream.

The two looked on and watched with horror as the beam kept flying, disintegrating all who were unlucky enough to get in its way. Elma and Goff could not see them, but Gwenybell watched as familiar faces got in front of the beam and used barrier magic in an effort to stop it.

That beam was undeterred and consumed the brave souls that stood against it. The beam flew on, mocking their foolish and wasted bravery, and burned a path through the village.

Distance could not save it.

Elma and Goff regrouped with Nixim as Gwenybell, distraught and pale as a ghost, looked toward the village. They wanted to look at the village too--to see the extent of the damage--but the snake was active, and its body was undulating. They looked on as a strange bellow reached their ears. It was in time with every undulation of the flaming snake's neck.

Elma was the first to realize. "I-Is it laughing?" Elma asked.

Goff clicked his tongue. "It thinks it got one over us."

"I would have to agree," Nixim said.

Light started trickling out of the shell's opening.

"It's going to fire again!" Elma yelled. She mustered up the last bit of her mana and sent her hands into her air.

"Look, friends!" Goff said. "The grass around the beast is dead."

Nixim erected another Holy Array. "I don't sense as significant of a pull in the natural mana! It'll be weaker!"

A second later, the malefic tortoise's putrid head came out, and it released another pink beam--albeit a smaller one--at the group of four.

Nixim managed to create a second array behind her first, and Elma shot magic from her palms down at the beam. Their two magics clashed with the beam, a thunderous boom marking the meeting. The joint efforts held the beam at bay, but there was no telling for how long they would manage.

"Your magic is having an effect this time, Miss!" Nixim said.

"It's being withered now? Ahh! That's it! I don't have any more!" Elma yelled.

"Damn it all! I'm sorry! Without my sword, I cannot use Stalwart Guard!"

The beam broke through the first array.

"Everyone! Dodge!" Goff roared.

Goff, Elma, and Nixim ran as a unit to their right, but all three despaired when they looked back and saw Gwenybell with her back to the beam, still standing, never having moved.

They all called for her as the beam broke through the final array. It went toward her with incredible force, and she turned toward it--

"No more--"

The beam swallowed her up. The trio yelled in frustration and horror. The beam traveled up the field once more. The adventurer's in its way cried out--

"Beam incoming!"

"Get out of there you idiots!"

"Don't try blocking; just run!"

"It's too wide!"

"No! Wait! Look!"

But before it reached the adventurers and other combatants--mere feet away from the biggest grouping--it stopped. Rather, the beam was still being fired, but it was as if it was hitting a wall.

"No more!"

The voice--everyone heard it, but it wasn't once that traveled through the air. No, it felt as though the voice had traveled into the listener's perception through their feet.

The trio of Elma, Goff, and Nixim watched as green, vibrant light started radiating from behind the pink beam. The people behind that light--their cheers started reaching their ears.

"What's going on?" Elma asked, her jaw slack.

Goff laughed. "It seems our favorite oracle had a few more secrets."

Green veins traveled up the beam, spreading from the green wall and toward the malefic tortoise. The trio watched as the green veins flew by and watched as the snake head stopped laughing and instead fired black flames at the green climbing up the beam like it was a bridge. The flames could not stop the energy's progression. It reached the tortoise and--

"ENOUGH!"

--the green energy swelled until it choked the pink beam and shattered it into many balls of light. The resulting force pushed the malefic tortoise back, tearing the roots growing out of its feet right out of the earth. It landed many feet away, and the snake head hissed at the one walking toward it.

The trio looked at the snake's enemy and felt their hearts lighten. She came walking beneath a gentle rain of light balls. Wherever her feet landed, grass and flowers grew when she lifted them. The balls of light smoothly fell into her body as she crossed them. A sweet fragrance tickled the nose the closer she came.

Her hair was auburn, but many antlers grew out of her head now. With each step, the antlers bounced as if they were as supple as a plant's stem. Her face had changed slightly, her features softening but her eyes becoming sharper and greener. Thin vines started growing out of her body, each growth centered on where a ball of light had soaked into her body.

This woman, Gwenybell, walked past the awestruck trio, each person bathing in her rejuvenating aura as she passed by. They also saw the faint outlines of a deer of some kind--one that stuck to her body like a protective aura.

"The Ancient Lord..." Nixim whispered, her words falling out of her mouth without any of their usual grace.

The malefic tortoise hissed as it stumbled backward. For the first time, the monster showed fear. The snake would sometimes feign that it would lunge at Gwenybell--almost like it was a puppy trying to appear scarier than it was.

Finally, once she had gotten too close, the snake released a stream of black flames at Gwenybell.

"You do not belong here, on this land," she replied as she lifted her hand.

The laser of green magic hit the black flames, and the final struggle between the two began.