There was no subterfuge for the back half of the rift. No leapfrogging forward with careful scouting and a plan of action. With the reduced time limit, Tajo led them at a reckless pace, loping forward with his swords at the ready.

  As they ran, Terry ranged ahead with his portals, desperately trying to head off any ambushes before Tajo led them face-first into one.

  But as he skipped his portals ahead a hundred meters at a time, he was surprised to note that the first group of beast-men were not hidden in pockets dug into the canyon walls, but rather arrayed in rows before them, the sword and shield soldiers in front, the archers slightly behind and elevated on rock outcroppings.

  A quick count showed twenty of the creatures and he called out the number and composition as they ran. Tajo glanced back, giving a quick nod before looking at José.

  “Can you send Roca in first?”

  José nodded agreement as Tajo turned back to Terry. “Intercept their arrows.” It was more command than suggestion, but Terry didn’t feel like arguing. “We’ll do the rest,” he added with a nod toward José and Lupe.

  “Fine,” he responded. He found Ellie with his eyes and noted her looking away, almost like she was avoiding his gaze.

  He pushed those thoughts away, focusing on the task at hand. It was his responsibility to keep everyone alive and he couldn’t afford to be distracted.

  As they rounded a corner, Roca in the lead, he spotted the waiting rows of beast-men. The massive summons let out a challenging roar, bulling through the front line before they could muster a response.

  With a flex of aura, he portaled to the cliffs above where he could have a better view of the battle. Arrows began to gather magical force in the backline—the archers mostly avoiding Roca’s charge from their elevated positions.

  He reached through space, finding the bows of the archers with a flicker of intent. Micro portals popped into existence, severing eight strings in rapid succession. Before even a single arrow loosed, the archers were weaponless.

  Tajo and Roca danced and stomped respectively, tearing through the group with ease. Lupe’s whips of blood speared forward, taking out the stragglers.

  In less than fifteen seconds, the melee beast-men were downed. The bowless archers tried to flee, but Tajo ran them down effortlessly.

  Terry portaled back down to the canyon floor, eyeing the blood and gore with a churning nausea forming in his gut.

  “Vámonos!” Tajo cried, charging forward.

  Roca let out an accompanying roar, José leaping onto his summon’s back. Lupe sped after them, her whips of blood trailing behind her.

  Only Terry and Ellie remained, but he kept his eyes on the dead and dying around them, knowing he couldn’t keep the frustration off his face if he looked at the girl. It wasn’t quite fair to blame her; Tajo and José would have pressed forward on their own, if nothing else, he was certain.

  Yet, he couldn’t help think that if something happened to any of them, it was on Ellie for casting that initial decisive vote.

  “We should catch up, Terry,” her voice called from ahead. He looked up to see her in the distance, having stopped her run to look back at him.

  His eyes trailed once more to the bodies, wondering if it would be Lupe, or Roca, or José lying in the dirt before the end.

  Or maybe none of them would die and his sensation of a ‘gut feeling’ was just trepidation over the fact that they were potentially allowing this rift’s invading world access to Earth.

  With a thought, he cut a portal ahead, stepping through without another glance at the waiting Ellie. He didn’t feel like being near the girl right now.

  The next three waves of creatures went as easily as the first—cut down by Tajo’s speed, Roca’s bulk, Lupe’s whips, and Terry’s defensive portals.

  When they reached the next grouping, they knew it was the end of the rift by the destination marker on their interface—and by the sheer volume of creatures and defensive structures awaiting them.

  Before them, a steep hill rose up toward wooden spikes angled at 45 degrees into the earth. Another wooden wall was erected at the top of the hill, connecting with a cliff face that stretched high into the sky. A dozen archers and melee beast-men lined the hill, positioned evenly around the protruding spikes. At the top, directly in front of the wooden wall, were four ballistas, manned by teams of two.

  If the first half of the rift had been any indication of what was to come, there would also be a boss hidden behind the wall somewhere.

  They grouped up out of sight at the bottom of the hill while Terry ranged forward with his senses. A small pinprick portal high up revealed the entire camp to them. Unlike before, there was no pavilion hiding the boss, who was pacing around the destination in a predictable pattern.

  “What do you guys think?” José asked. “Charge them head on like always?”

  Tajo nodded agreement, but cast Ellie a sharp look as she scoffed. She met the look with raised eyebrows.

  “Oh, you actually think that’s a good plan. My mistake.”

  José bit his lip in thought, but Tajo met her sarcasm with a fiery look. “What’s your genius plan, gringa?”

  She shrugged, as if there was nothing on her mind. “I don’t know, but maybe not meeting a ten-foot-tall boss on an incline where we lose all mobility and advantage? Just a thought.”

  “What’s the alternative?” Lupe asked, looking between the four of them hopelessly.

  Ellie just pursed her lips in a knowing smirk before looking toward Terry.

  In sync, the others looked to him, too, as if he had some grand strategy in mind.

  Racking his brain, he considered the options, the pressure of their gazes forcing his mind into overdrive.

  “Well…our biggest limitation is our escort target—” He nodded toward the faceless mannequin. “—not staying put if we split up.” He chewed his lip in thought. “That being said, I think Ellie’s right, facing the boss on uneven ground is just asking for trouble.”

  “Then what, Rosito!” Tajo snarled. “Give me solutions, not problems!”

  He met the Duelist’s gaze coolly, not fazed at this point by his annoying demeanor.

  “One solution,” he started, “is to take the fight to the boss, clear it off the board first. Then we can attack the remaining creatures from the high ground.”

  José and Lupe were nodding, but Tajo narrowed his eyes skeptically.

  “And how does that deal with our escort problem?” The man indicated the target with a wave of a sword. “The stupid thing will just charge up the hill and get itself skewered.”

  Terry didn’t have a good answer, but thankfully Ellie spoke up.

  “Maybe we can incapacitate it in some way?” she suggested. “Keep it from being able to move?”

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  That idea had Terry’s thoughts turning. If the others weren’t around, he might have been able to craft manacles from metal and hold the target in place while the others cleaned up the enemies. But with just portals, he didn’t see any way he could hold it in one place, since he couldn’t force it through a portal.

  “I’m not sure how, is the problem,” Terry said. “Lupe, could you tie it up with your blood whips?”

  Her eyebrows rose in surprise. “I could try.”

  With a quick flex of aura, she wrapped its ankles with blood. Tajo started back the way they’d come, commanding it to follow. Terry watched the target in anticipation, expecting it to topple over as it tried to follow.

  Instead, its legs seemed unstoppable, stretching forward as if there were nothing restricting it. Lupe’s face scrunched in concentration, but it was immediately obvious that the target wouldn’t be stopped by the whips.

  A moment later, they snapped and Lupe staggered from the magical feedback. The target walked toward Tajo as if nothing had happened.

  “Well, there goes that idea,” José said.

  “I could try,” Ellie said, surprising them all.

  “What’s an Infuser gonna do?” Tajo asked with a scoff.

  Ellie’s eyebrows rose dangerously. “You wanna find out, sword-boy?”

  He snorted derisively, waving a hand toward the target with obvious disbelief.

  Their healer walked toward the faceless target, placing her hand upon its head. When Terry’s Skill Analysis didn’t ping, he scrunched his brow and pulled it up with a thought.

  Active Powers in Range:

  Tether: Active Summons (José)

  Enhanced Durability: Active Summons (José)

  Enhanced Body Proprioception (Tajo)

  System Weapon Tether (Tajo)

  Blood Manipulation (Lupe)

  Draw Blood (Lupe)

  Unknown (Ellie)

  His eyebrows furrowed as he read the list, but the target slumped bonelessly to the ground, pulling his attention away.

  It lay in the dirt, unmoving as the group stared on in shock.

  Ellie lifted her chin, a haughty expression on her face. “You’re welcome.” She directed it at Tajo, who pursed his lips with an annoyed look.

  “Yeah, yeah, you finally did something useful. Congratulations.” He turned to Terry with an expectant—almost demanding—tone. “Let’s go, send us up there.”

  “Hold on,” Terry said quickly. “Who’s gonna stay with the target? If a fleeing beast-man ran past it and decided to randomly skewer the thing, our day would go to shit pretty fast.”

  “Leave her,” Tajo said with a nod toward Ellie. “If any enemies come by—” He took on a malicious smile as he looked toward her. “—she can just knock them unconscious.”

  Terry opened his mouth to protest—her power required touch it seemed, and getting in close without the element of surprise was a tall task—but Ellie stepped forward first.

  “I can do it.” Her eyes slid from Tajo to Terry with a subtle nod. “I can do it.”

  “Great!” Tajo exclaimed before Terry could get in a word. “Don’t screw this up, gringa.” His eyes narrowed dangerously. “If you’re the reason we don’t get our new Skill…” He trailed off, the threat nonetheless clear as day.

  Ellie’s serious expression shifted into a smug smile. “I won’t let you down, sword-boy.”

  He rolled his eyes at that, turning expectantly toward Terry.

  Despite the ease with which they’d made their plan, a knot of trepidation had settled in his stomach. But he could tell from the impatient fidget in Tajo’s bouncing step that the man would not be convinced otherwise.

  All he could hope was that Ellie was as competent as her confidence suggested.

  “Here we go,” Terry said, prompting a grin from the Duelist.

  Reaching through space, he found the boss patrolling back and forth in a set pattern.

  “I’m gonna open the portal right above its head,” he told the group. “On my go, send Roca through.”

  José nodded acknowledgment and Terry used his pinprick portal to gauge the timing. A handful of breaths passed as he lined up his aura, then ripped through space.

  “Now!”

  As the large portal appeared before them, Roca was already charging forward. He watched the giant hippo enter his portal, felt the pull on his aura, then watched her massive bulk smash directly down upon the unsuspecting boss.

  She crashed to the dirt with an impact that they heard all the way from the bottom of the hill, though Terry couldn’t see the damage done beyond her body. Tajo didn’t wait for confirmation of the kill; he was already racing after the hippo, passing through the portal with a much lighter tug on Terry’s aura.

  He watched as Tajo landed lightly on Roca’s back before flipping off with an acrobatic tumble. A moment after Roca gained her feet, treading away to reveal the boss below.

  Its limbs were twisted unnaturally, a splash of blood from its mouth coating the dirt ground. A groan escaped its lips and it almost seemed as if it would rise to its feet like some unstoppable behemoth.

  Then Tajo’s swords stabbed into its throat with a shink and the boss spasmed once before very clearly dying.

  A warning cry went out up and down the fortified hill. From their vantage, they could see the melee beast-men turning to race toward the camp as Tajo appeared at the gate entrance like a specter.

  “Come on, let’s go!” José cried, and the two of them followed the Summoner, leaving Ellie to defend the target.

  As they passed through the portal, Terry spotted Roca shambling toward the camp gate, preparing to crush the enemies arrayed below. The three of them followed the hippo, spotting Tajo already dancing through the enemies like a whirlwind of metal.

  To the right and left, the ballistas appeared to be gathering magical energy to their giant bolts. It seemed Tajo had left them for the others to deal with while he met the enemies further down the hill.

  “You go left!” Terry called to Lupe even as he raced toward the right side. He didn’t look to see if the woman followed the direction, turning his full attention to the beast-men manning this side’s ballistas.

  He summoned micro portals to snap the thick strings of the weapons, a twanging sound echoing out even as he turned his portals to the nearest enemies. They were slow to respond to his presence, their attention having been focused on lining up a shot on Tajo. But as he raced toward them, they pulled short swords and braced for impact.

  An impact that never came.

  Six hand-length silver needles shot magically forward, spearing each of the enemies straight through their eyes. He had learned earlier that killing them with cutting portals was doable, but required his full attention to deal with them one at a time. Their aura’s resistance was enough that he had to focus his efforts—something he couldn’t do with five other enemies charging him at speed.

  To cover his tracks, he now created six portals, shearing through their necks where they lay dead on the ground. Without a meticulous examination, it would simply appear that he had decapitated them all with portals.

  With all the nearby enemies dead, he turned to make sure Lupe and José had finished off their side. He watched as her blood whips fully embraced a beast-man, then sheared back and forth with a sawing motion. A moment later, their last enemy fell to the floor—cut into four distinct pieces by the Elementalist’s whips.

  Below, Tajo was death itself, dancing between foes like a grasshopper. Of the dozen he had been facing, only two remained, and as Terry watched, eventually even those two were struck down by the man’s acrobatic style.

  With that done, he glanced up toward them where José gave him a thumbs up, before he turned back down the hill. He let out a shrill whistle and Ellie popped her head up from where they’d left her before the fight.

  The four of them regrouped as their healer led the target through the now-abandoned fortifications.

  “That went well!” José said with a cheer in his voice.

  The worried expression Lupe had been carrying the entire rift finally melted away, replaced with a beaming smile. “We did it!”

  Even Tajo’s surly face smoothed, revealing his teeth as he nodded agreement. “Well done everyone.” His eyes found Terry, then glanced over toward the six decapitated beast-men on the ground. “Not bad…for a Traveler.”

  Terry snorted, but nodded acknowledgment. It was finally settling in—they’d done it. Nobody had gotten hurt and the target was nearly home.

  Sure, they’d have to reach the first camp before the other world’s rift opened up. But that was one portal away with his C-ranked strength.

  They were home-free!

  As Ellie neared, she saw their smiles—even Terry’s—and gave them her own, strangely subdued, smile.

  “We’re done, then?” Lupe asked, as if not believing it could be that simple. “We cleared the Bonus Objective, too?”

  Tajo gave her a friendly pat on the shoulder—an unusual gesture for the angry Duelist—and nodded toward where the boss lay dead. “All that’s left is to see this faceless freak into the circle.”

  They treaded back up the hill, Tajo taking command of the target to lead it into the camp. As the five of them approached, Tajo paused before the yellow circle.

  “Rosito.” He looked back with a teasing smile. “Why don’t you open that portal back to camp now, hm?”

  Terry shrugged, reaching through space. It wasn’t even close to the edge of his range to return them to the first camp and a moment later, a blue portal cut through space.

  Tajo nodded, his smile widening. He ordered the target into the circle and it moved mutely. A series of notifications crossed his vision.

  Bonus Objective complete. Calculating reward…

  Aura Projection: C3 → C5

  Aura Control: C8 → C9

  Aura Perception: C4 → C6

  Presence Average: C5 → C7

  New Skill awarded: Kinetic Analysis

  Kinetic Analysis (C)

  Activate to determine the velocity, acceleration, and direction of an object. Range of detection is determined by Aura Perception.

  Due to total rift completion, access will be granted to the Dirg’Ghee in five minutes. Delvers may now enter the attached Dirg’Ghee world. The rift will remain open and bi-directional until five members of either race vote to disengage the rift. A vote can only be initiated at the center of the rift.

  Upon successful rift closure, the remaining delvers may decide which world to return to.

  Time remaining until bi-directional access: 4 minutes 43 seconds

  Patreon here!