After throwing another glance back over his shoulder to make sure they weren't about to get stomped into paste by the dragon, Luke turned his attention to Liza. Taking her face into his hands smeared the blood leaking from her eyes, and he got it all over himself. A renewed roar from the dragon and a brief bout of a weaker type of fire spell made him flinch, but Luke didn't look back. Nate and Hannah would protect him, and a lot of people were leaving Liza's still-standing barrier wards, just walking through them like they were made out of air.

  "Liza?" he asked, giving her a gentle shake.

  She didn't answer. Her eyes remained unfocused.

  "Shit," he muttered, extending a second thread into her mana channels. Even with his own stores lacking, he gave a small amount of mana to her meta-heart. That wouldn't save her, not when the wards drained it out of her at far too high a rate.

  Snapping his fingers in front of her face didn't do a thing, so he grabbed her shoulders and shook her. Nothing. If this kept up and she didn't regain consciousness, the wards would just drain every speck of mana out of her.

  "I need someone with mana over here now!" he shouted, looking around.

  Liza's health bar began draining. A little at first, then at an alarming rate.

  Lightning crackled and turned the warm light in the cavern white and cold for a second, striking the dragon in the side. The attacks from before resumed, but people looked exhausted. In the distance, Luke caught sight of Milla. He waved and shouted her name, but she didn't seem to hear or see him.

  "Crap, crap, crap," he muttered as he poured a health potion into her open mouth.

  Liza's health bar ticked up to about two-thirds but then began falling again. Stopgaps wouldn't do it. If she didn't stop holding on to the barrier wards, she was a goner. With that in mind, Luke dove into her mana channels and used Weaver's Eye. The flow of mana was going away from her meta-heart and toward her arms, continuing to her hands before ending at her fingertips. From there, they connected her to the spell somehow, but no matter how much Luke strained and tried to force it, there was no way to see what happened to the mana after it left her body.

  Weavesense was no help either, not like when someone first cast a spell. Then, the strands and patterns that made up the weave revealed themselves to him, showing the spell being created. Not so with Liza.

  The fight against the dragon was a fierce one, and judging by the sound, people were getting injured. Time was running out, both for Liza and for all of them. At least the Deep Dweller hadn't returned. Well, if he couldn't see what happened to the mana beyond her fingers, one single remedy remained. Luke would just have to cut them off to stop the flow. That would work. Wouldn't it?

  Amputating the physical fingers wasn't what he was planning on, of course. The one thing that mattered when using mana was the mana channels. Slice through those, and the spell should stop. That was the solution, the only one he could think of. With no time to lose, he affixed Needle of Life to a thread of mana and breathed in, focusing to shift the needle from the physical to the metaphysical.

  How exactly he did this, Luke wasn't quite sure. When he pulled a mana channel into the physical realm, he'd received a new skill. Part The Web's skill description left a lot wanting, but vagueness seemed to be an intricate part of the Lifeweaver class.

  Having no time left to ponder how he was able to do what he did, Luke just did it, slicing through the mana channels up at her elbow to make sure he got them. That done, he moved on to the other arm to repeat the procedure. Liza didn't flinch, but he hadn't expected her to. Damaging the metaphysical didn't lead to physical pain, in Luke's experience.

  The barrier wards disappeared throughout the cavern, revealing those still huddling within. Several stood and fled toward the back, to the tunnels Hannah wanted them to stay out of. There was nothing Luke could do for them, but Liza seemed like she was going to be okay. Mana no longer streamed from her meta-heart, and her health, while not regenerating on its own, had at least stopped plummeting.

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  A warm glow enveloped her, and Luke stood to see Milla, his sister, charging toward them, the rest of her party in tow.

  "You needed help with healing?" she asked before her eyes caught someone behind Luke, and she cast another healing spell. The spellweave, shown by his Weavesense, was an intricate showing of what looked like the rays of the sun shining down on a lush forest. It was almost like a painting.

  "She couldn't stop her spell," Luke said, pointing to the now unconscious Liza.

  "This is such a shitshow," Nymh shouted as she ran up, followed by Curtis, who gave Luke a nod. The rest of Milla's party spread out behind them, and Penny walked around them to stand next to Hannah, never taking her eyes off the dragon.

  In that moment, the dragon released another brief barrage of fire, and Luke thought he heard Mateo shouting something on top of its back, where he was still moving around, sticking his spear into the monster.

  Nate's shield enlarged, protecting them all, and Curtis's blade turned black. The flames that touched the weapon fell into it and disappeared without doing any damage whatsoever. Reaver was a strange class.

  "Tallest," Nymh said, pointing to Liza, "Grab her and move her away from the fight."

  Integrated, Flynn. Longstrider, level 9.

  The average-height, not at all tall, man reached down and scooped up the unconscious woman. He put her in a fireman's carry with practiced ease, like he'd done it a thousand times, then sped away without a word. That done, he set off with a flowing stride, almost like he floated right above the ground.

  "Liza was your party leader, but she's out of commission for now. I'll step in," Nymh said. "Since I can't see how we're supposed to disentangle ourselves from the Airborne Cave Lizard, we'll have to defeat it. Curtis, Nate, Luke, and Hannah, I need you up close. I'll keep in contact with you using the gem. If I give you an order, follow it right away, understand?"

  Rather than directing the question to Luke, Nate, or Hannah, her eyes bored into Curtis, who gave a curt nod. "Sure."

  "Penny, I need you to focus your attacks on its head while Curtis and the others strike at its foreleg to bring it down. The madman in your party up top isn't doing a damn thing. Hitting its back like that? Pinpricks, if it even pierces its thick hide."

  Nymh drew in a deep breath, then sighed. "Milla, keep healing him anyway. We can't have him dying on us, at least he's a distraction."

  "You've been healing Mateo?" Luke asked Milla.

  "Of course. I'm healing everyone I can reach, as long as I have mana to spare."

  "Speaking of mana, does anyone have a mana potion?" Luke asked.

  Nymh tossed him one. Luke grabbed it, downing its contents. "Thanks."

  It wasn't much, but at least the headache stopped, and his fingers no longer trembled.

  "What are you waiting for?" Nymh asked, "Go, go, go!"

  Curtis set off with a lumbering stride. Nate didn't have too much trouble matching the Reaver's speed, despite his heavy armor, and Hannah and Luke ran after.

  This was stupid, just so stupid. The looming dragon was enormous, the size of an apartment building, if not bigger, and somewhere up there in the darkness, he knew the Deep Dweller still watched them, even if they could no longer see it. It was sheer stupidity to charge in, but Nymh had been right. Disentangling themselves would be difficult, and it meant leaving the brave souls who were attacking the dragon behind. While he wouldn't take a bullet for any of them, except perhaps for his sister, Luke wouldn't just abandon them either. Besides, after Hannah's warnings, Luke wasn't so interested in revisiting the tunnels either, which meant attacking was the only path forward. They needed to kill the dragon and then head into the dwarven town.

  Even with all those things in mind, it was sheer madness to charge toward an enormous monster so far above them in level that the inspect just showed question marks. Many of those who fought near its clawed feet were either injured or dead, and Luke couldn't help but look up, seeing its huge eyes regarding him and the others in the small group charging toward it.

  That stare turned his legs to jelly, and he almost stumbled on a piece of raised rock in his path. He looked away for no more than a second or two, and in that time he heard the others cry out, then a hiss of air and a growl, followed by the sound of huge jaws snapping together.

  Fearing the worst, his head shot back up from the ground to see a mass of thick shadows holding, Hannah having built a makeshift wall to protect against an attack from the dragon. It had attacked then but had failed to reach its prey. Its head remained lowered, and it bit down on the black wall again, as if thinking it was an enemy to destroy.

  Curtis sidestepped the wall, leapt upward, clearing an impressive height to strike right at the dragon's lowered head. Even with Curtis's incredible speed, the dragon reacted in time and pulled back far enough that the huge dark blade grazed its long neck, rather than strike its face.

  Then, even before Curtis landed, it struck again, lashing out using its head more like a club or cudgel, slamming it into Curtis, who let out a yelp as the impact hurled him back and down at a steep angle. The force of the blow was enough to make his body bounce against the bare stone floor on impact before coming to a stop not far from the dragon's left foreleg.