When Blaze realized the supportive magic bolstering his body had cut off and his crew wasn’t returning to assist him anytime soon, he redoubled his assault—desperate to finish off Puppet Town’s champions before the situation devolved any further.

  Unfortunately, the man had some mana seeds in his belt pouch, and he ate one now to top off his reserves. As the firebug’s reservoir refilled, he issued a maniac grin while getting ready to let loose with the full power of his lethal skillset.

  Edge was circling around with Foebinder poised to strike, hoping to take the firebug out before he had time to unleash more combos. However, the Claw had anticipated the move.

  As the black chain reached out to grab him from behind, a Wall of Fire sprang to life, bathing the living links in a torrent of crackling flame.

  When Blaze’s magic washed over Foebinder, the animate loops let out a mental shriek of anguish. He could sense the manifestation breaking apart and deactivated the skill before his partner took any more damage.

  It was easy to forget the left chain of oblivion was weak against magic, since it hadn’t taken a direct hit from a powerful spell until now. Luckily, while they were cracked in a dozen places, the links hadn’t fallen apart. Edge could still use Extraction, but he would have to be extremely careful until the Unique skill had time to recover.

  The firebug cackled as Edge darted away from the searing barrier. Something in the man’s tone told him the next attack would be unlike anything that had come before.

  Sure enough, the elite blew through a full tank of mana conjuring a massive sphere of flame that kept right on growing—changing from yellow to white to incandescent gold as the defenders were driven back by the fierce and rising heat.

  Sometime in the next ten seconds, the potent combo would hit critical mass, and a tsunami of incandescent magic would come crashing down upon the defenders of Puppet Town.

  If Edge wanted to save his friends, not to mention his own life, he needed to work fast. He only had one move that had any hope of countering the strike leader’s cataclysmic casting, and he’d begun preparing it on the run.

  Now it all came down to whose spell finished first.

  He hadn’t been able to manifest his domain while standing near Blaze. There was simply too much fire mana riding the breeze for Maelstrom to form. But from this far back, he was able to get the job done.

  Edge kept pumping out wind mana while watching the elite, completing his skill a fraction of a second ahead of his foe. The rest of his team had noticed the danger and begun raising their own defenses, but he could already tell that their efforts wouldn’t be enough to save them if this didn’t work.

  As an apocalyptic wave of liquid flame came streaking across the charred soil while casting ever-shifting shadows across the battlefield, Maelstrom manifested, and a gale began to blow.

  There was so much mana infused in Blaze’s combo that pushing against it with wind wasn’t going to cut it. It would shatter his domain in two seconds flat, and even if it didn’t, he doubted his spell could overpower the elite’s.

  Instead, Edge visualized a complex, twisting pattern of gusts that pulled the flames into a circular current, making them easier to control while minimizing the extent to which the elemental mana mingled. He put everything he had into feeding the domain while flaring Regulate Temperature as hard as he could.

  For a second, it looked like it would work, then his magic began to unravel.

  In that moment, he knew Maelstrom wasn’t strong enough. Blaze’s flame was going to break through and kill everyone within a hundred feet of his position. It was already so hot that his organs were in danger of shutting down, causing black spots to dance before his eyes.

  That was when he sensed activity inside his core. In his mind’s eye, Edge saw Sea and Regulate straining while focusing their wills. His avatars’ assistance granted his skills a momentary boost, turning the tide in his favor mere heartbeats before he was vaporized.

  His blistered skin cooled as a solid wall of swirling wind went howling across the prairie, colliding with the wave of golden flame and forcing it to rise. The churning conflagration shot over his head, forming an immense flaming tornado that stretched toward the stars above and lit up the prairie like the sun at noon.

  He was caught in the periphery, but it was only a fraction of the combo’s full strength, since most of the fire was whirling above his head. Maelstrom couldn’t remain manifested in the face of so much opposing elemental energy and cut off—Sea sagging with exhaustion at the effort she’d expended.

  As Blaze voiced his frustration to the uncaring heavens, Edge doused himself with Repel Water. His gear was smoking, but the spray stopped it from burning, and though he was scorched and seared, it wasn’t too much damage for Regeneration to heal within a matter of seconds.

  The resplendent tornado had spread fiery mana across the battlefield. He wouldn’t be able to use Maelstrom again, but thanks to his avatar’s assistance, the domain had been enough to save his life and drain Blaze’s mana along the way.

  It was a close save, but the fight wasn’t over yet.

  Edge’s stomach dropped when he saw the elite reach into his belt pouch and pull out another mana seed. As he dropped it into his mouth, Trapper blew it toward herself with a puff from Manipulate Air, swallowing the slice of fruit as the strike leader howled in impotent rage.

  The firebug’s reservoir was running on fumes after his massive attack, but Trapper’s had just been filled to the brim.

  “Let me deal with him,” she yelled as she moved to engage Blaze blade to blade. “Help Earl beat Yussuf before it’s too late.”

  Edge nodded and rushed to join the sheriff, who was battered and bloody but still standing strong.

  At long last, it was time to bring the fight to the Claws’ leader, and he was ready to pay Yussuf back for all the suffering he’d caused.

  ***

  As Edge moved to assist Earl, he was overcome by a wave of doubt. I shouldn’t get in their way. Yussuf is too powerful for me to handle, and I’m not worthy of standing before him.

  When Edge realized what he was thinking, he was deeply confused. He had already made his decision, and there was a good chance that if he didn’t act now, the settlement would lose its most powerful protector and the war shortly after.

  He forced himself to take another step, and his uncertainty shot up again. He struggled to overcome his bout of self-doubt, but it simply wouldn’t go away. This isn’t like me. I’ve fought in pitched battles with my life on the line on numerous occasions without anything like this happening.

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  As he gritted his teeth and pressed on, he figured out what was going on. Yussuf was using mental magic against him—something far more subtle than anything Ella had tried. In that moment, the dynamics of the situation snapped into focus. Earl wasn’t fighting Yussuf alone because no one was strong enough to help him; they were being held back by the same psychic assault Edge was experiencing now.

  He hadn’t been using Mental Fortress during the battle, since he needed to conserve mana for his other skills. The moment he switched it on, the compulsion vanished, and Edge charged in—ready to end the war for Puppet Town and make Yussuf the Red, Yussuf the Dead.

  Judging by the overwhelming ferocity of his attacks and the dense flows of mana permeating the area, Yussuf was considerably more dangerous than his strike leaders—who had each been deadly in their own way. If Edge wasn’t careful, he would get taken out of the fight before he had a chance to help, or worse, get in Earl’s way and give the Claws’ leader the upper hand in a brawl that was balanced on the point of a knife.

  As he drew near the site of their duel, he watched the next exchange of blows, trying to get a better sense of Yussuf’s skills and tactics before committing to a course of action. Judging by the mana flowing around his form, the man was bolstered by an aura and several passive skills. Even without them, Edge suspected the convict’s attributes were considerably higher than his own.

  However, the real problem was the warlord’s ranged attacks. He could make out traces of something shimmering in the air every time Yussuf ignited his core. Whatever they were, Earl was focusing on them with every drop of concentration he could muster, doing everything he could not to take one head-on.

  Whenever the sheriff couldn’t dodge in time, he used Manifest Mineral to create a shield of stone. Each time the Claw’s mysterious power collided with them, shards went flying with incredible force. Taking two or three was enough to reduce entire boulders to rubble, and Edge had a hunch that his diamond scales would meet the same fate.

  He wanted to spend more time analyzing the convict’s powers, but that wasn’t an option under the circumstances. I’ll focus on defense for now and try to take some pressure off Earl. With that, he conjured his iceblade and came charging in.

  No sooner had he set foot onto the battlefield than Yussuf glanced his way and ignited his core. Before Edge knew what hit him, Wind Ward erupted into existence, creating an intense shield of turbulence for a fraction of a second.

  Whatever had triggered the ward had been flying straight for his throat. When the spell impacted the screaming shield of air that was boosted by Fear the Seasons, it exploded three feet in front of his face.

  The next thing Edge knew, he was tumbling head over heels—earth and sky changing positions at an alarming rate as he was hurled across the prairie like a stone skipping across a pond. The amount of energy in the eruption was intense, but he’d sensed that before Wind Ward dispersed it, the magic had been concentrated into a narrow band.

  He landed hard in the grass, rose to his feet, and went racing to rejoin the fight. If that had struck me, it would have blown me to bits. If I take a direct hit, I’ll be dead before Regeneration has time to put the pieces together.

  While it had been an unnervingly close call, it had given Edge an opportunity to examine Yussuf’s magic up close. He wasn’t sure how it worked, but he was certain the man was using a wind-based attack that flew fast and was hard to track with both his eyes and energetic senses. When he watched the sheriff block one with a slab of manifested stone, he got a better sense of the skill’s range.

  It can only travel twenty feet before dispersing. If I want to close the distance, I need to use something sturdy to shield myself en route. Nothing too close to my body, or I’ll wind up being blown away again.

  Wind Ward won’t be ready again for another four and a half minutes, but I might get a chance to use it one more time over the course of this fight. If I’m careful, I can use it to surprise Yussuf, get in close, and land a critical strike.

  When he made it back, Edge came to a stop thirty feet away from the Claws’ leader. He couldn’t deal any serious damage until he found a way to draw near, but he could still serve as a distraction and help the sheriff catch his breath. He only had two moves that outranged the man’s wind attack, so he figured that was a good place to start.

  He pulled his chakram out of his vault but didn’t throw it yet. Something told him that Yussuf would dodge it effortlessly if he couldn’t catch the man off guard. Meanwhile, he ignited his core while visualizing the arrangement of fields that let Repel fire a stream of high-velocity water.

  A wrist-thick jet went spraying from his position, heading toward the stretch of soil where the Claw was in the middle of lining up his next attack. He canceled the skill and stepped out of the way when he saw the water coming, but Edge took a page from the gatekeeper’s book and panned the stream to track his opponent.

  Yussuf must have realized it wasn’t strong enough to hurt him and tried ignoring the skill. But that was hard to do when Edge adjusted his aim so Repel was spraying straight into the man’s face. He swore and darted out of the stream, firing off an attack that erupted ten feet in front of Edge, knocking him back but not doing any real damage.

  The brief exchange hadn’t hurt either of them, but it had granted the sheriff a chance to recover his stance and take the initiative, and a legend like Earl wasn’t about to let the opening go to waste. The Sheriff of Puppet Town coated his war hammer in earth mana and sent it slamming into the ground, creating a spreading Fissure that went streaking for Yussuf’s position.

  At the same time, he Pounded one of his own rocks, sending a spew of jagged shards angled to hit the convict as he leapt over the crevasse. But the warlord was too crafty to fall for Earl’s trap.

  Yussuf hit the dirt while tucking his shoulder, performing a rolling dive that carried him over the Fissure with inches to spare. Some stray shards caught him, and while most were deflected off his leather armor, several sliced into his exposed skin. It wasn’t anything serious, but it was heartening to see the deadly warrior bleed for the first time in the fight.

  Earl had taken advantage of the opportunity to come charging in, covering half the distance before the convict had time to react. Edge fired off another spray while flinging his chakram and circling around to approach from behind. The rivals came together a heartbeat later, trading a ferocious barrage of blows.

  He was finally close enough to cast Warlord’s Mantle, so he conjured one for Earl while using his glove to fling his Elemental Blade–infused chakram time and time again, picking angles where he wouldn’t hit the sheriff if he missed.

  At first, Edge couldn’t understand how Earl was enduring so many of Yussuf’s attacks. While he was busy blocking the man’s sword with his hammer, several wind skills had slipped past his guard. The next time it happened, Edge took a closer look and learned the answer.

  In addition to creating slabs of stone to serve as shields, Earl could use Manifest Mineral to coat his body in a thin layer of ultra-dense rock. It wasn’t enough to block Yusuff’s skill outright, judging by the way he was dodging like mad, but bolstered by Edge’s Mantle, it let the sheriff withstand the explosions that ensued, leaving deep cuts behind instead of blowing him to smithereens.

  The sheriff was bleeding heavily, and if he took many more, the warrior would be in serious trouble. He was blocking most of the warlord’s magic with his weapon, but even that was problematic. Each wind attack was chipping away at the hammer’s head and slicing into its haft. Earl’s weapon won’t last if the fight drags on much longer.

  Edge needed to do something to tip the scales, but if he closed the distance without a plan, he’d be dead before he knew what hit him. While he scrambled to come up with a strategy, he did his best to divide Yussuf’s attention. Repel wouldn’t work while the rivals were engaged in melee, so he focused on his chakram instead.

  The next time the Claw ducked beneath the bone-and-brass ring, Edge used his glove to send it curving back around, letting loose with Intimidating Roar for good measure.

  The abrupt change in trajectory caught Yussuf by surprise. The weapon lodged itself into his armor without punching through, but that was sufficient to transfer the chakram’s payload of subzero mana. The man flinched at the arctic assault, giving Earl a chance to break through his guard. Fast as thought, his oversized hammer came whipping around, screaming as it tore through the air.

  Left with no other choice, the warlord parried the powerful blow. Blocking it was out of the question, even for a warrior of his caliber. Though he deflected a portion of the momentum, it was a heavy hit. Earl had comboed Pound and Shockwave, magnifying the force of his swing and priming the hammer to release a cone of force on contact.

  Yussuf was only caught in the periphery of the attack, but it rattled his bones and savaged his flesh, throwing him back a good twenty feet before coming to a skidding stop with a snarl of fury.

  The sheriff didn’t look away, but he offered Edge a grinning thumbs up as the war for Puppet Town reached its blood-splattered climax.