Once he found the right moment, Tahir jumped into the fight between Giralldo, Shukri, and the Huntress. Right when the other two had backed away, he rushed in with his sword, aiming for the heart, only for his blade to be deflected by the warhammer. “Finally found your courage, have you?” As Tahir moved back to avoid being hit by the hammer, Giralldo glanced over and spotted the bodies of the men Tahir killed. “The hells were you scared for, kid? Those three would’ve been platinum.”
Tahir didn’t respond, and he backed away as Shukri and the Huntress rushed past him. Giralldo held off against them pretty well, threatening with his warhammer and dodging away from their claws and spears, but Tahir getting into the mix seemed to swing things in their favor. He moved in, and the two hunters accommodated immediately, and Tahir found himself knowing where to move and when to strike in order to avoid disrupting them - and he supposed that came from the combat sense that summoning the Huntress granted him.
They worked like a well-oiled machine, and soon enough Giralldo started to sweat, and based on his expression began to worry about the rapidly growing number of attacks that slipped through his defenses, striking against his aura shield and wearing him down. His warhammer only ever seemed to connect with Tahir, who could deflect it using a negligible amount of aura from the earth spirit enhancing his weight, and when he did, he always used the opportunity to get a hit in himself, or to allow one of the other two to swoop in, during the moment their target was distracted by the deflection. They drove Giralldo back like this, forcing him on the defensive, not giving him a moment to try to make his own series of attacks. Once again, this situation reminded Tahir of his fight with Ester, how she pushed him back and didn’t allow him to retaliate, only this time he stood on the opposite side.
Eventually, they pushed him to the point where his back landed against the barrier. With a loud yell, before the onslaught against him could continue, he slammed the warhammer on the ground with enough aura infused to send up broken chunks of earth flying ahead of him, forcing the three combatants to stay away from him for the time being. Tahir took the lull in the fighting to refill the Huntress’s spiritual energy once again, which she’d used half of during the fight. He didn’t have a lot of mana left to cast many spells, but he could refresh that pool once more or so if he needed to.
“Alright, you guys are good, I’ll give you that.” Giralldo said between pants. Tahir got in a stance to leap in again, but stopped when the mercenary’s tattoo began to glow, and Tahir felt an odd wave of aura. Similar to the wave of fear, which didn’t affect Tahir anymore, but it felt like it came from a different source, one that combined itself with Giralldo. “But I’ve got a job to do.” As he spoke, his voice took on a slightly different tone. It sounded deeper, and with another voice speaking at the same time. Eyes wide, Tahir cast the soul sight spell, fixing his gaze on Giralldo and finding the spectral silhouette of another being inhabiting the same body.
“He’s summoned a spirit?” Tahir said in disbelief, watching the mercenary’s muscles bulk up, and his height rise a few inches before his eyes.
“Hmm. Not quite. Not in the same way you’ve conjured me.” The Huntress replied, and then looked to Shukri. “Eyes up, descendant of mine. This hunt just got interesting.”
Tahir watched Giralldo rush forward toward him, much faster than before. So fast that Tahir might not have been able to dodge if he hadn’t been under the effects of the potion. The warhammer slammed into the ground, sending debris and chunks of earth flying from the impact. He quickly came in for a second swing, and Tahir dodged just out of the way, no longer confident about his ability to deflect them. The Huntress and Shukri joined in a second later, coming at him simultaneously from both sides. Giralldo swung his hammer in a wide arc, and the two of them dodged. Shukri going low, and the Huntress going high. Aura enhanced claws raked across his legs and back, but he continued unbothered and managed to get his own counters in. He elbowed the Huntress, and kicked Shukri within the same motion, sending them flying back with aura infused strength.
Taking a deep breath, Tahir focused his aura and sent a wave flying out in a downward swipe. This caused Giralldo to whip around toward him, and bring the warhammer up to block the wave. Thankfully, it bought time for the other two to recover, but the situation had already spiraled out of control. They needed to find a way to end things quickly. Tahir himself had used more than half of his remaining aura, he only had enough mana left to refill the Huntress once more, and Shukri probably couldn’t take another hit like that without running out of aura as well.
With a glance, the three converged on Giralldo once more. Seeming to spot another attack from all sides, Giralldo quickly slammed the ground with his warhammer with enough force to cause a notable tremor in the ground, and a shock wave that threw all three of them off and threatened to topple them over. Tahir recovered the fastest due to the earth spirit, and he looked back toward him to see Giralldo rushing toward Shukri and raising his warhammer for an overhead strike.
Time seemed to slow once more. Tahir poured as much aura into speeding himself up as he could, but he wasn’t sure if he could save Shukri here. He could make it, but he didn’t know if he had enough aura to block the strike. Even with the Huntress helping him. He could gather all of his aura and mana into his sword again and hope - pray to use quintessence again, but he had no guarantee that the energy would come to him this time, and if the act didn’t end the fight immediately then he wouldn’t be able to move afterward.
With every aura enhanced step, his mind raced miles, reaching back. To earlier in the fight, to earlier that day, and to the previous week, even, trying to find something he could use to help Shukri. His eyes flicked between Giralldo, Shukri, and the Huntress. The hammer raised, poised to fall down. He leapt toward Shukri as the Huntress seemed to recover, but she wouldn’t reach her descendant in time.
As that thought passed through his mind, Tahir had his answer. Something he couldn’t believe he’d nearly forgotten. “Mikharma!” He called. A surge of power rushed through him at the moment he reached Giralldo. He brought up his blade in an upward swing, deflecting the warhammer and dispersing the force of the blow away from Shukri. Out of the corner of his eye, Tahir spotted several people recoiling from the barrier as the force caused a notable impact. A second later, a flying kick sent Giralldo skidding a couple dozen feet away, and Mikharma came to stand next to Tahir as Shukri quickly picked herself up.
“To think she’d already told you my name. I planned to make you work for it.” The spirit said, though the grin on her face told Tahir that she didn’t really mind that much. Speaking it empowered her as well. She, and the affinity she gave Tahir now functioned as tier three. He had a third of his remaining aura left, but after refilling Mikharma’s spiritual energy with the rest of his mana, she had most of her pool.
“Apologies, I won’t let such a blunder happen again.” Shukri said, though she wasn’t clear on whether or not she meant telling Tahir her ancestor’s name, or nearly getting flattened by the warhammer. “Let us end this hunt, shall we?”
Tahir nodded, as Giralldo seemed to recover. Tahir himself could also feel the effects of the potion beginning to wane, as well as an ache in his wrists after deflecting Giralldo’s warhammer. They had to make the next exchange the last one.
They jumped in as a unit, a small pack of predators that went after their prey. Tahir rushed in first, the only one among them with the weapon, the weight, and the aura to trade blows with Giralldo, bolstered with fading speed that allowed him to outmaneuver and get his own blows in as well. Mikharma and Shukri’s claws proved more dangerous than Tahir, but they only moved to strike when Tahir could press Giralldo, tearing away at the mercenary’s aura shield, and Tahir managing to carve away at it as well when Giralldo attempted to switch toward either of the beastfolk. This time, they left no room for error and did not relent. Shukri’s and Mikharma’s blows became stronger as they grew more confident. Pouring more and more aura behind each strike to destroy the aura shield even faster, knowing that Tahir would keep the mercenary’s strikes at bay.
They finally moved back, spent of most of their aura, when they saw the mercenary covered in bleeding scratches and sword wounds, having finally broken through his shield of aura, and looking like he could barely stand. “Last chance to surrender and tell us how to undo the barrier.” Tahir said. Pure adrenaline kept him from feeling most of it while he fought, but the dull ache he felt on his wrists had spread throughout his body.
Giralldo looked between the three of them. Shukri and Mikharma still poised to strike, and Tahir holding his sword out in a stance. The man spat out blood and grinned, giving a laugh laced with multiple voices before he spoke, for the first time since he summoned the spirit. “Sorry, kid. Surrender ain’t an option for me.”
Another wave of aura burst out from him, somehow still different and more powerful than before. Tahir struggled to comprehend what was happening, until he focused back on his soul sight - which he’d let wane during the fight, but never actually dispelled. He saw the ‘color’ of Giralldo’s soul, a dark orange being overtaken by an odd sort of purple. His eyes widened as he realized what was happening. “Wait! Stop! You won’t be able to go back from this-!”
But it progressed, despite Tahir’s warning. Giralldo’s skin turned purple and scales grew in patches all across his body. His face extended slightly to be more like a reptile’s, complete with a maw full of sharp teeth. He dropped his warhammer, and claws sprouted out from his hands. He’d given his soul, and what remained of his aura, over to the spirit, and it transformed him into an amalgamation of the two beings.
Mikharma moved to stand in front of Tahir and Shukri. “Lashing out like a cornered lizard. He doesn’t know when to quit.” She said with a sigh. “I supposed this will be my fight. You do not have enough aura left to survive even a glancing blow, and you can’t move.” She said, addressing Shukri and Tahir respectively.
Tahir tried to step forward to stand beside Mikharma, but as she said, he couldn’t even take a step before pain shot through his entire body. He’d let too much time lapse between the fighting and began to feel it more, and it seemed like he had fractures, strains, and possible breaks in multiple bones in his body, wearing down against the output of aura. Had he simply not been able to handle fighting with Mikharma’s tier three affinity? The effects of the potion had finally faded away as well, so he’d have to use the rest of his aura just to move at normal speed.
“I can help, just give me some time.” He reached into his storage bag, even finding that painful, and he searched for one of the auric recovery potions that Theo made. Between that and the ring that boosted his auric recovery, he might have been able to compose himself enough to fight through the pain.
Mikharma cracked her knuckles and began to walk forward, but a passing shadow overhead gave her pause. Giralldo looked ready to begin the fight, his transformation complete, but even he stopped in his tracks when the form of a raven landed between them, and in a puff of smoke and feathers, turned into the Raven. “I considered the possibility of Giralldo’s involvement in this affair, and I applaud you for driving him into such a corner while I struggled on how I might handle him.” He said, with a smile toward Tahir, Shukri, and Mikharma. “The rest of the offending escorts have been dealt with. Allow me to give this matter my full attention.”
