"A historic day lies before us, Cinders!" Infernal Spiderbane shouted from atop her makeshift podium of crates.

  Ahead of us, standing atop a massive platform as wide as several football fields, two enormous iron doors were built into the far end of the Fourth Floor. Both of these doors stood a hundred feet tall. And guarding them, the reason we were here, were two motionless creatures of death.

  The Two Guardians.

  "Look at them!" Spiderbane pointed at the cloaked giants. "Three hundred years, these things have stalked the surface, hiding in shadows and picking us off one by one when to explore even a little bit far from the Academy. Too many good Cinders have been torn apart for simply wanting to explore the surrounding areas of the pillar."

  Her voice dropped to a growl. "But a few months ago, mere recruits killed one of these ancient bastards during their first Trial. Recruits!" She gestured at us, Forgemen. "Which means they bleed. And they die. And while their numbers are reduced, we will take advantage of it and return three hundred years of death, with interest."

  A warrior’s yell erupted from our chests. My friends and the other Forgemen around us beamed with pride, remembering how we'd worked together to kill the Guardian on the First Floor. We didn’t know they could die at the time, we had to take a chance. Now, with an army of five hundred trained Cinders, we believed we could do it again.

  Lucile hopped off the crates and transformed instantly into her Third Form, signaling the attack. She grew large and a vicious scorpion tail coiled around her back as she kicked off with her feet, charging at the two motionless Guardians.

  It was like watching a zoo release all its predators at once. The Cinders who could transform did. And the pressure from the army grew as those individuals surged with power and fury. Sand flew as five hundred bodies charged. Roars, screeches, and bellows rippled across the army.

  Black chitin erupted from Spiderbane’s skin as she ran, forming a deep onyx armor. The plates rattled with each flick of her tail. The Infernal grew into a twelve-foot-tall, half-human, half-scorpion nightmare. Her crimson hair retreated into her skull while her hands twisted and morphed. Spiderbane’s left hand became a chitinous shield, while her right hand stretched and sharpened into a bone lance.

  "Wow," Silas breathed beside me.

  Mel leaned on our stretcher, scowling. "Remind me why we can't fight? We both hit Third Form."

  "Orders," I said. "Someone needs to retrieve the wounded."

  "Bullshit. We killed a Guardian with no infusions. Now we're forced to watch?”

  "Maybe they want to 'protect the children,'" Sora mocked in Hakashi's raspy voice.

  "Forgemen!" Hakashi barked from ahead. "Quit complaining and focus. I’ve never seen such ungrateful bastards. You’d think you’d be grateful to stay out of harms way. Now watch! They're moving."

  The Guardians, gothic nightmares at least thirty feet tall, wore executioner-like robes. They had stood motionless since we arrived on the tall sand dune leading down to the door they guarded: one blue, and one red. The blue-robed one held a long black flail dripping with dark liquid, and the red-robed one held a long scythe resting lazily across their back. I could not see any discernable faces beneath the hoods only a swirling blackness.

  The red robed Guardian took a step forward as the Expedition Army charged. It leaned back and screamed.

  “SHRRRRIIIIIIIIIISSHHHHHHHH!"

  The red Guardian's cry hit my ears like needles. I cupped my ears instinctively, only to find that covering them was useless. The sound pierced straight through, leaving a lingering ache behind my eye.

  Then, I heard another high-pitched wail. This scream came from behind me. In its sheath, the black sword on my back screeched so that only I could hear it. The strident shrill sent spikes of pain through my skull, melding with the cry of the Guardian. The cursed blade was hungry. It had sung like this before. Once, when we fought the First Floor Guardian, and again when we fought the evil soul controlling Noah.

  It wanted blood. Powerful blood.

  Agh, that’s loud! It really wants to fight them, huh?! Fern's voice echoed my pain.

  It really does! It’s going to have to be patient, though.

  The Red Guardian walked forward slowly, its long limbs making each step unsettling to watch. The blue one remained perfectly still.

  The Expedition army spread out mid-charge into a pincer formation.

  The Red Guardian lifted its scythe behind its head, and a small black cloud formed above it. Black lightning crackled along the jagged blade, and the Guardian turned towards an open space, away from the Expedition Army.

  "Shit... What is that—“

  The Guardian swung down, severing a rip into reality itself. A black portal opened where the scythe cut, and inside it flames sputtered out.

  “Don’t slow! Don’t slow!” Lucile commanded as the Expedition Army kept charging.

  Then, hell poured onto the battlefield.

  Hundreds of red imp-like creatures erupted from the portal—ten for every Cinder. The battle shifted instantly. Imps, the size of small dogs, flew down by the handful and grabbed Cinders, hauling them skyward before dropping them. Even from hundreds of feet away, the wet thuds of bodies hitting sand echoed up to us.

  My hands trembled.

  “Oh shit. Team One, go! GO!" Hakashi shouted.

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  Waelid and Galina sprinted toward a downed Cinder crawling through the sand.

  The Guardians stood watching the summoned imps cause havoc among the cinders. My heart was beating, and I wanted to go in and help, but the Cinders were all in their own Third Form; these men and women were just as strong as I was. What could I do? I cursed myself for not being stronger. Watching this massacre…I felt helpless.

  Lucile adapted fast. Her battle cry cut across the chaos, and suddenly, spikes were being fired from her tail. Then, more spikes were launched into the air, piercing the flying monsters. I followed the new spikes and saw that Lucile had positioned aerial specialists—Cinders with specific Third Forms built for range. Imps fell like shot birds, and when they fell, their bodies created a red rain.

  "What's happening?" Mel strained to see.

  “Can’t see with your infusion gift?” Lucius mocked.

  Mel spat at him, causing him to jump out of the way. “The Pangobadger has a better sense of smell than eyesight. I smell blood from both sides, but I can’t see.

  Silas pressed something on his mechanical arm, and two crystals rearranged themselves into makeshift binoculars. He held it up to Mel and she peered through. “What a beast! She and the other ranged users are shredding those things!”

  “Ranged power, nice!” Sora shouted.

  "TEAM TWO!" Hakashi's voice snapped me back. He glared at me. “I’ve called twice! MOVE!"

  I flushed with embarrassment.

  "Sorry sir!" I grabbed my end of the stretcher, and Raine and I started running.

  Raine rolled her eyes over her shoulder, but she matched my pace, leading us toward the battle without taking off alone.

  At least she waited this time, Fern observed.

  I didn't reply. All my focus went to the nightmare we were running into.

  Imps dove at us from every angle; thankfully, they were incredibly easy to dodge. Loud thuds of their small bodies plummeting into the surrounding sand muffled their screeches when they crashed.

  "Right!" I shouted.

  Raine pivoted hard, digging her heel into the sand, then changed direction. The imp miscalculated and face-planted ahead of us. Raine didn't break stride and kept rushing towards the injured Cinders.

  "Left!" I called.

  This time, she thrust a high kick that sent an imp cartwheeling across the dunes, all while holding onto the stretcher.

  And she's a good fighter too! Fern's admiration bled through my concentration.

  We reached our target, a Cinder that an imp had dropped from fifty feet up. Both legs were twisted, and white bone jutted through his shin. Blood had pooled in the sand around him and clumped the grains together..

  Raine wrapped his legs together while I lifted him onto the stretcher. We ran back through the battlefield, dodging both imps and falling bodies. The Guardians still hadn't moved; their imps were keeping the Expeditionary Army at bay.

  This repeated five more times. Sprint out. Dodge or kill imps. Retrieve the wounded. Sprint back. My feet were raw in my boots, skin chafed with every step. Thankfully, adrenaline kept me moving.

  "Team Two! Far left!" Hakashi shouted.

  We ran again. This time, fewer imps harassed us—Lucile's aerial units were winning the sky battle. Red bodies littered the sand like dropped fruit.

  We reached the wounded Cinder quickly. But even so, she was already gone, eyes staring absently at nothing.

  "Damn it." I lifted her anyway—Hakashi made it clear we didn't leave bodies for the Guardians.

  Then, a small red hand burst from the sand and seized Raine's ankle.

  "Ah!" Her scream cut short as she was yanked beneath the surface.

  The sand swallowed her completely in less than a second.

  What just happened? Where'd she go?! Fern's panic spiked. Erik, do something!

  His panic was stressing me. I had to clear my mind and ignore him while I breathed deep and called the Chimera.

  Power crashed through me. Wings tore from my back, and Fern's snake-form erupted from my tailbone. I grew to my full Third Form and launched into the sky.

  "She was dragged below," I growled, my voice now inhuman. I pointed to the spot she had been taken, next to the dropped stretcher. “Same move as the Third Floor. Ready?"

  "Ready," Fern hissed, the black sword already in his mouth.

  I flew higher, then flipped and aimed for the spot. With gravity and muscle working together, I spun—becoming a diving drill.

  I hit the sand at terminal velocity.

  The impact was explosive. Sand and stone shattered as I punched through the desert floor into darkness. I crashed into a cavern and rolled, coming up in a defensive crouch.

  My eyes adjusted quickly thanks to my Third Form. There was no other light besides the one in the hole I had made. No light except... dozens of red eyes staring at me.

  As my vision deepened, I saw that well over fifty imps lived in this underground chamber. And in the center of the room, on a pile of fresh corpses—Cinders we hadn't retrieved in time—lay Raine.

  I pulled free Lightcutter. The dagger, already short, looked small in my Third Form hand, but the blade was strong, and could cut through many things. So I readied myself, holding it in my right hand and tensing my left to react to anything that comes near. Fern readied the cursed blade in his mouth and faced away from me meeting the gaze of the Imps I couldn’t see.

  "Raine," I whispered. “You alive?”

  I caught the slightest nod, as she lay still.

  “Good,”

  Then the red eyes charged.

  They came in waves, screeching. But with Fern covering my back, we had no blind spots. The first imp met my blade from head to tail bone and a burst of glowing red blood spilled onto me. The blood stayed luminescent and had a little bit of a glow. Suddenly, we had light.

  Every dead imp became another small source of light, and soon, we were no longer handicapped in the darkness.

  Fern and I became a whirlwind. Fern carved through anything that tried to attack from behind, while I led the charge, cutting through the small flying monsters. I grabbed one imp and used it as a shield against three others, then threw the mangled body aside.

  The glowing blood painted the cavern walls like a demented art project, where we added more and more blood to the canvas and more and more light glowed until the cave blazed in crimson and orange.

  When I threw the last imp away from me and its body thudded to a stop, the echo lasted for seconds.

  "I... think that's all of them," I panted, reverting back to human form. Exhaustion filled me just as fast as the Chimera’s power had strengthened me. My hands dripped with luminescent gore as I helped Raine up.

  "Thanks," she said softly.

  "No Cinder left behind. Now, let’s find a way out."

  I looked above me but, the hole I'd made when I crashed in, had somehow sealed itself. But Raine had already found a second option. She called over to me and pointed to a narrow tunnel.

  "Wind," she said. "I can feel it. This way."

  "You can sense it? I’m usually pretty good about feeling wind with my infusion, but I can’t tell that at all.”

  Raine nodded and led us into the tunnel. We had to crouch, and my back began to ache, but I trusted Raine; she seemed to be confident in her senses, leading us, twisting through stone passages until finally—

  We emerged into a vast chamber.

  “This… doesn’t look like a way out.” I said.

  “It looks like a temple…” She said curiosuly. She pulled out a notebook and began jotting down some notes.

  “Journaling at a time like this?” I asked.

  “If the ones who came before us never wrote on an Expedition we wouldn’t have any of the protocols we have today,” She said without looking up.

  I kept inspecting the large temple-like room. Ornate tiles formed intricate patterns across the floor. Twenty pillars supported a ceiling painted like the night sky, with stars made of glowing gems. Oil braziers stood at each corner, casting warm light across the carved walls. And at the far end of the room, a wide granite staircase led to massive double doors—forty feet tall.

  The doors opened slowly, sending dust into the room.

  The blue-robed Guardian walked through so smoothly it was as if he was gliding. It turned its empty hood to us and a white mist came from inside like breath on a cold day.

  “Finally,” it rasped. "The green-haired one."

  It raised its flail and slammed it down. The floor split toward us in a cascading wave of destruction.

  I shoved Raine left, and I dove right.

  Why is this one mentioning our hair, too? Fern said, scared.

  The memory of the First Floor Guardian popped into my head, but I shook it away. There was no time to think, I had to fight.

  So I called the Chimera again.