I dashed toward him, blade low and cloaked in Hellflame.
Our weapons clashed. Sparks flew. The obsidian spear didn't yield, didn't so much as chip under the force. But that wasn't the problem.
The problem came after.
He stepped into the clash and shoved, not just with muscle but with pressure. It surged out from him in a pulse, invisible but tangible, like hitting a wall of packed air. It knocked me back a step.
And in that moment, he changed his approach.
The spear detached.
Not physically, but in how he used it. His hand no longer guided it. The pressure did.
It hovered around him, guided by intent. With his arms free, he came at me barehanded. Not wild. Controlled. Heavy.
His fists moved like extensions of the same force that controlled the spear. Sharp jabs, open palm strikes, bursts of invisible weight behind each motion. One punch caught my side and staggered me. Not deep enough to break anything, but enough to throw my stance off.
The spear whipped around and slashed toward my shoulder. I twisted and deflected with my blade, barely catching the shaft in time. It spun away and came again from the opposite angle.
I ducked. Rolled. Rose up with a slash, forcing him to retreat two steps.
He didn't look frustrated. If anything, he seemed focused. Calm.
He extended one hand and the spear flew back to his palm. He caught it mid-spin and lunged.
I met him head-on.
Weapons struck again. Hellflame flared and washed harmlessly over his armor. I ducked his return strike and slashed across his ribs. Bark split slightly. A minor wound.
But he didn't slow down.
The pressure around him surged. It was like fighting a storm wrapped in discipline.
I had fought many things, but this was different. He was strong, but that's not the only thing. He was strong because every motion had purpose. Every strike, part of a form. Every pause, part of a rhythm.
He was trained, heavily.
He mixed between using the spear in his hands and guiding it with his pressure. Switching without hesitation.
It threw me off.
Not because I couldn't keep up.
But because it was unfamiliar.
I needed time to adapt.
Jackal attacked from his side. His sword slash was caught by the flying spear, but he still managed to kick the warrior in the face through his guard.
The impact pushed the warrior back, and I rushed in. I saw an opening while the spear was occupied.
"Brand."
The mark appeared on his chest, right over where the heart should have been. He dodged in time, but his arm was caught. Flames burst from the mark.
Without a second of hesitation, not knowing if Hellflame could erase more, he raised the spear and severed his own arm.
"Oh, this guy is dedicated," Jackal said, not sounding the least bit worried. He knew the fear would begin to settle in soon. If the warrior survived that long.
We both rushed at him this time, but his spear caught us easily. Every strike landed at the perfect angle, deflecting our blows with minimal effort. He had adjusted already.
His stance had shifted. The strikes came faster now. Less precise, but rapid.
He was compensating for the loss of his arm.
And it showed.
He couldn't keep both of us at bay for long. The injuries were stacking, small at first: cuts, burns, bruises. Even if his spear could resist Hellflame, he couldn't.
The damage was starting to stack up.
And he was beginning to tremble.
Jackal was feeding. I could feel the fear bleeding into the warrior's rhythm. Not enough to break him, not yet, but it was happening.
Which also meant Jackal was growing stronger.
His swings were hitting harder now. Each one pushed the warrior back a step, the pressure behind them building.
I activated Ember Step and reappeared behind him, slashing across his back. He turned in time, so the cut wasn't deep, but it didn't need to be. Erasure was erasure. Skin and muscle vanished, and pain followed.
It would not be long before one of my strikes ended it.
The warrior was losing.
And he knew it.
Then he did something new.
With his remaining hand, he surged mana through his palm and shoved it forward, toward the tunnel behind us.
The pressure built fast.
I recognized what he was doing just before it happened.
He wasn't attacking us. He was collapsing the tunnel.
The walls were shattering, stone cracking and splitting under the invisible force. The corridor began to shake, loud and violent, as tons of rock gave way.
I grabbed Jackal with one hand.
"Ember Step."
We vanished just as the tunnel caved in behind us, reappearing farther ahead. Debris crashed down where we had been, sealing off the path.
Silence followed.
The dust hadn't even cleared yet when I looked around.
We were trapped. No going back. Only forward now. Into whatever lay deeper in this place.
"Well that is just wonderful. I hope that it at least died if it got us trapped here," Jackal said, brushing dust off him and peering back at the collapsed tunnel.
I didn't answer. I was still watching the rockfall, still half-expecting that obsidian spear to pierce through the rubble.
It didn't. At least not yet.
"Come on," I said finally. "If he's dead, good. If he's not, we'll find out soon enough."
Jackal gave a low whistle. "That's the spirit. Lead the way, fearless one."
We kept moving.
The tunnel ahead was darker now. Quieter. But it was the kind of quiet that felt temporary.
Something else was waiting deeper in. I could feel it.
We kept walking, but there was a lingering presence around us, at all times.
Not the warrior. Something bigger. It felt like this place was more than a ruin. More than a stronghold.
And the more we approached, the more it seemed like this was a hidden civilization, buried deep beneath the earth, waiting for something.