The start of the battle was no frenzied, light-speed affair as he’d expected. Quite the opposite, if anything. The gargoyle’s mana didn’t burst forth like some tidal-wave to crush and flatten all before it, but rather, oozed into the air. 

It spread like some foul miasma, twisting and churning as it slowly claimed dominion over the area. Slowly, he thought, being the keyword. 

Everything under its sway seemed to grow quiet, lethargic, from the trees to the very grass beneath its feet. Even the breeze seemed inconsequential within its area of influence and colour itself lost its lustre. 

Ash felt its power clash with the blanket of mana that the tribe maintained over themselves and despite being as shielded as he was, he could still sense its potency leaking through the protective bubble and could feel some small measure of the creature’s power affecting them. 

Ash felt his strength weaken by a slight margin, his eyes growing heavy and a powerful desire to just give in and go to sleep right then wash over him. It was tempting, he would admit, but it wasn’t anything that an applied force of will couldn’t counteract. 

None of the goblins dared to give in to its alluring whisper either, but the fact that he was even affected despite the distance and the protective shield left Ash dreading to think what the nine were enduring right then. 

A few of the tier three’s visibly shook, their faces growing slack and their limbs sagging by their side as the monster’s mana demanded their defeat. Even Sylaxxa seemed to droop lower than her norm, her placid expression growing a touch too placid by his estimation. The only one to dare to keep his back straight and his demeanour unchanged was Senniaxx, his smile growing even wider in the face of the aura bearing down on him. 

“THIS IS NOT ENOUGH!” he bellowed and from him burst a powerful scarlet mana that churned and thrashed against the air, as if it attempting to claw at existence itself. It washed over his allies and their figures abruptly straightened; their lethargy shunted away in the face of the restless energy. 

Ash felt his emotions stoked as a tinge of Senniaxx’s aura touched him, and in it he felt love and desire and defiance and energy chief among all. That was Senniaxx’s element, he realized, enlightened by contact. 

Passion. Movement. Action. 

The perfect balance to the monster’s lethargy. It seemed to sense as much as its calm expression grew stiff, and perhaps surprised. 

“WARRIORS OF EVERWATCH! TO ME!” bellowed the goblin chieftain, and with that, the battle began in earnest. 

Senniaxx was a blur of movement as he leapt towards the beast, an axe in hand which he hefted into a downwards strike. Five of the tier three’s followed behind, their mana ablaze as their elements and nexii empowered their movements. One goblin transformed into a veritable dust storm that attempted an encirclement of their foe, and another grew big enough to loom over even Ash, his skin shifting to a shade of deep purple and his features changed to resemble some bestial ogre. 

Sylaxxa herself was aglow with mana as the earth around her shook and tore itself into sand before forming into a sand-dial twice her height that immediately started ticking down. 

And despite all this. Despite the undeniable show of power cascading towards it, the gargoyle remained unmoving. Its eyes half-lidded. It seemed to wait until Senniaxx was almost on it, the hefty axe’s head inches away from its face, before it acted. 

Ash shook as he felt time itself slow, the barrier between them straining to keep away the activation of the monster’s skill that threatened to bring even his thoughts to a crawl. Bereft of the shield, Senniaxx was not so lucky. His leap slowed to a miasmic creep in mid-air, as did suffer the rest of the nine. Even Sylaxxa’s sand dial ticked down at a glacial pace, enough that he could count each grain of sand as it fell. 

The monster looked to Senniaxx then, its gaze bereft of any hostility or regard of any form. It ambled towards him and then raised a large hefty palm until the chief's face was engulfed in its grip. Ash felt his heart lurch and his blood turn to ice at the sight. He wanted to scream out, to do something to stop what he knew was about to happen, but the monster’s skill proved too potent and it was all he could do to even try and maintain his coherency of thought. 

Still, attempts were made. Ash struggled to turn and eye a few goblins as they sluggishly tried to clamber over the parapets, blood leaking from their noses as they fought the monster’s skill to try and make it down onto the battlefield. Amongst those already in battle, their expressions painfully shifted towards one of alarm and a few spells bloomed from frenzied fingers in a vain attempt at saving their chief. 

But it was all too slow. 

Stone-like fingers clenched and the helm he wore proved of little worth. Senniaxx’s head was crushed like a melon, blood spraying in slow-motion from what had once been a skull. 

The creature observed its handiwork for a moment, its mood unreadable, and then turned towards its next victim, the hulking goblin who was the closest, and languidly strode towards it to rinse and repeat. 

Ash wanted to vomit at the sight, and his mana flared in a futile attempt at fighting through the lethargy so that he could do something. Anything. 

Half-cries were already leaving lips at a glacial pace, and tears blooming upon wide-eyes. He couldn’t bear their suffering. Something had to be done. 

Someon- 

Ash’s eyes widened as he caught Sylaxxa’s expression. The elder wore no grief on her wrinkled visage, nor indeed anything else. Hers was a look of absolute focus as mana visible left her body in wisps and flutters. 

What was she tr- 

And then it happened. 

The sand-dial shifted despite the monster’s effect, the grains flowing at a rapid pace until a fifth of it had fallen away, and then the monster paused, its eyes wide with genuine surprise. Its skill shattered like the crack of thunder and the fate of the goblin chief was undone. Like some macabre show played in reverse, Senniaxx’s skull remade itself shattered piece by piece until it was again whole. 

The goblin chief landed upon the earth where the monster had stood before erupting in a blaze of mana that wrapped around his axe and empowered his steps far beyond anything he had shown so far. A blink of the eye and Senniaxx was upon the gargoyle, his axe crashing down like a meteor strike. 

The creature’s eyes were wide but it didn’t bother to attempt a block. Its figure instead shimmered and shifted as its stone skin turned a steely-grey and a second-skin of glistening metal slid over its back, right beneath where Senniaxx’s blow was to land. 

The chief struck anyway, uncaring for the defensive measures its foe had in play. A thunderous clang echoed out across the clearing, and an explosion of sheer force struck against the walls as boundless might clashed with unyielding steel. 

The steel won. The creature’s skin laid marked, but unbroken and its mana bloomed to try and attempt another skill, but another spell struck it first. Twisting gnarly roots struck out from the earth and wrapped around its legs and lower body, its source a snarling goblin stood beside Sylaxxa. The creature roared as its spell started to flutter and it redoubled its effects but the Everwatch would hardly give it a moment to breathe. 

The hulking goblin crashed against it like a freight train, its massive bulk slamming with a resounding thud against the gargoyle’s mass. The creature grunted and was pushed back a few steps, but no more. It shot an imperious look at the mere tier three that had dared to challenge it so and raised an arm to try and swat it away, but a dust-storm engulfed its figure, choking its eyes and face. 

It grimaced and unleashed a wave of its mana to try and throw away the pests that kept disrupting it, and successfully dislodged both the hulk and the dust-storm, but Senniaxx was not as easily swatted away. The chief’s mana forged itself into a massive blade around his true axe, and it was that massive thing that cut down onto the gargoyle’s head. 

The blow struck true, and the creature lurched, wounded but far from dead. Senniaxx twisted around for another strike when an arm of twisting metal and grasping claws erupted from the earth and stabbed at his side. With the deftness of a practiced warrior, the goblin chief shifted stances and brought his axe around to bear the brunt of the strike, weathering it with only minor damage though it sent him careening away from the creature. 

It turned then towards Sylaxxa, its eyes narrowed as it seemed to register the elder as the true threat. It made no roar, no bellow, no cry at all but its eyes served well enough to make its grievances clear. The gargoyle raised an arm and oozed out its languid power, forming it into nine grey, translucent constructs of itself. One for each of the goblins, Ash supposed. 

The nine goblins reoriented themselves quickly and tensed, their mana bared as they awaited the creature’s attack. It came, but not as they’d expected it to. One of the constructs shimmered and winked out from existence. 

A goblin stood beside Sylaxxa spasmed in that instant, her eyes aglow with a fel grey light before she stilled. And then she struck, but not at the creature. The goblin shrieked a deathly sound as her magic was turned against her own allies, shards of earth and dirt rising to assail Sylaxxa and her guard. 

The goblins were caught by surprise but quick to act nonetheless. A wall of roots and tendrils rose to shield the elder from the attack, and Senniaxx burst forth in an explosion of scarlet mana, visible wind mana empowering his speed to beyond what the mundane eye could follow. 

The gargoyle didn’t even spare him a glance. 

A construct disappeared and a hulking goblin eyes alit with the monster’s gray mana charged at Senniaxx, rippling muscles raised to strike his chief down. 

Senniaxx grunted and deftly danced out of the way. Another construct vanished and it was rising tendrils of roots and vines that threatened to end him then. He swore, and Ash swore with him. 

With every moment that passed, another goblin was being taken over. Within minutes, all of them would be lost, until the monster attempted to possess Senniaxx and Sylaxxa herself. The fact that it hadn’t already done so was either a mistake on its part, or an admission that it lacked the ability to do so. 

Or perhaps it was just toying with them. Either way, Ash didn’t like how things were unfolding. They’d managed to squeeze out a rhythm to the battle but this new skill had upended that with imperious ease. 

He dearly hoped that Senniaxx or Sylaxxa had a way out of this situation. 

That thought was echoed clearly across the faces of every goblin upon the walls, their hearts in their mouth as they watched their own kin strike against their chief and elder. 

Senniaxx too was aware of their fears, his narrowed gaze pausing on the wall for a moment before he again refocused onto his assailants. A bitter smile crossed his lips then, and his eyes glistened with mana as he glared at the gargoyle. 

“I wanted to save this for the Lord himself, but I suppose that I was foolish to try and hold back against a tier five foe. You were right all along, honourable elder!” 

Sylaxxa snarled at him then as she repelled a blow from her possessed kin. “I told you so, fool!” 

The chief laughed at that. “Fine then. Let us give this all we have!” 

The chief did something incomprehensible then. 

He dropped his axe. The hulking goblin was on him then, arms raised to smash him into the dirt. Grasping vines followed after, their thorns jagged and hungry for blood. A streak of poison and acid joined them as another goblin fell prey to the gargoyle’s spell, leaving only three tier threes possessed of their own wills. 

Senniaxx did nothing to stop them and their attacks rained down on him without mercy. Fists struck him with a fury that made Ash wince, and thorns ripped at the exposed skin between the cracks of his armour, angling to find purchase to inflict greater damage. And the poison burnt and sizzled as it splashed onto his side, catching the hulking goblin in the process who paid the friendly fire no heed. 

Like animals in a wild frenzy, they mindlessly unleashed all they had onto the goblin who accepted it all without struggle. For a minute, this continued, until something odd happened. The hulking goblin stopped, and then the plant mage followed. The poison mage was next, and the earth mage after. 

One by one did the possessed goblins shatter the foreign mana controlling their will until they were all free once again. The gargoyle furrowed its brow at the sight. It had only managed to possess six of the tier threes before its hold was broken. It turned to eye where a plume of roiling dust and debris marked where Senniaxx had fallen. 

Its eyes narrowed and it summoned onto itself a thicker layer of metallic skin that covered it whole, and then another pyramid-like structure to ensconce itself in. It was wary of something. 

Ash stared into the growing dust cloud and found nothing to prompt that reaction, though he hoped to be proven wrong. 

A moment later, he was. 

“EVERY WOUND, AN HONOUR!” 

His voice reverberated through the clearing like the war-cry of a legion, and his presence bloomed in an explosion of vivid scarlet mana. The dust was cleared and there stood Senniaxx, his skin as red as blood and his figure larger than even the hulking goblin by his side. Orbs of red flickered upon his eyes and wicked black tattoos crawled across his visible skin, stories of slain beasts and trophies won spoken of in every line. 

His aura washed over Ash and every goblin upon the walls then, and it infected them with the same desire and energy that flowed through Senniaxx’s veins. 

One that demanded battle to the fullest, and battle without end.