Ashtoreth filled the air in front of them with hellfire, her own flames negating those of the dragon and giving them a small pocket of space within which they could stand unharmed.

Frost's minigun whirred as he landed beside her, producing a stream of pale blue shots that he focused on Morax Tol's head, where they cut into the oncoming stream of white fire to collide harmlessly with his defensive magic.

Frost changed targets, moving the stream of fire from the invulnerable dragon's face to the one remaining crystal-topped tower… which was instantly protected by a spherical barrier.

Wow, this is bullshit, he said. Is this how people feel when they fight against me?

Not even the sacred damage gets through his spell? Ashtoreth said, pulling another heart from her locket to consume it. Dang.

Morax Tol's jaws snapped shut a moment later as he abandoned his dragonfire plan, and he surged forward, charging them.

Ordnance incoming, said Gao.

Both of them rose into the air a moment before a veritable hailfire of missiles rained down on Morax Tol, encasing him in smoke and fire as they broke against his armor. The largest of them smashed against his chest a second or so into the barrage, but even though the shockwave pushed Ashtoreth back through the air and made her ears ring, he rose out of the cloud a moment later, completely unharmed.

For a second, Ashtoreth thought the attack had been a waste. But then she saw what must have been Gao's true objective: the last of the spell-channeling towers had been destroyed in the midst of all the chaos. Whatever manual defense Morax Tol needed to engage to protect them, he hadn't thought to do it while the bombs rained down.

The last of his towers, she thought. She doubted that they'd fully severed his connection to whatever power reserves he had below, and obviously Kylie still needed to disable his invincibility… but surely this would help to curb his apocalyptic spell-spam.

Morax Tol came surging out of the smoke toward them a moment later, and they both dove as they spotted him, trying to swoop under him to land on top of the palace once more.

Frost, however, wasn't as fast as Ashtoreth in the air. As she landed against the metal surface of the pyramid, she spun to see something that made her blood freeze in an instant. Morax Tol had caught Frost in midair, and now had him pinned beneath one of claws.

Hunter!

The dragon raised his other claw, his tail weaving through the air to draw a glowing rune. Another massive pillar of light gathered above Frost…

Hunter appeared next to Frost amidst a cloud of inky shadows. Morax Tol's eyes flicked down to take in the new arrival, but his claws and tail were occupied pinning Frost and casting his spell.

Hunter's katanas slashed at the narrowest part of the forelimb that Morax Tol was using to pin Frost to the ground, slicing into the flesh from two sides like a pair of scissors.

The shock and surprise in Morax Tol's voice was plainly evident as he squealed and drew back his claw, an arc of dragon's blood trailing in the air behind it.

Ashtoreth let out an appreciative grunt as she moved in to put herself between Morax Tol and her allies. Hunter's ability to penetrate defenses was better than any Dazel had ever seen… but even considering that, she had to admire the kind of power that could break through a spell as strong as their enemy's protections.

"What's the matter?" Hunter said, spreading his own dark wings. "Afraid of a little blood?"

He surged forward toward the dragon, and he and Ashtoreth both instinctively split to move to either side of their enemy, taking an attack pattern that they'd used on massive creatures many times before.

It was a mistake. Hunter was the only threat: Morax Tol wasn't exposing himself at all by putting his back to Ashtoreth, because none of her attacks even had the power to throw him off-balance.

At the same time, Hunter was hardly vulnerable to Morax Tol. The endless barrage of massive, deadly spells had abated now that the last of his six towers had been shattered by the human explosives, and what was left was a fusion of firebolts, white lightning, dragon's breath, and the standard tooth, claw, and tail.

Hunter and Frost might have been higher levels than they were used to, but they'd still fought enough dragons, and eaten enough people who had fought dragons, to know how to fight them. The trick was to not be afraid of getting in close, of diving and dancing around their legs and under their belly, of making them constantly pivot, shuffle, and fly around to get a better shot with their jaws and tail.

The three of them worked the dragon on top of the pyramid, moving in and out to protect Hunter as he monopolized Morax Tol's attention. Hunter had no problem taking a glancing blow or suffering mild burns while Frost was around: he was simply healed almost immediately.

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As they fought, Ashtoreth wondered at Morax Tol's confidence. A dragon's breath scaled off their [Vitality], and draconic spellcasters tended to use their breath to fuel their spells. As such, there was no doubt he had an extraordinary ability to regenerate, just like her, and she wasn't keen on trying to run him out of [Health].

But Morax Tol must have realized that he'd lost the upper hand. He had no towers, and even if he was invulnerable to everything but Hunter's attacks, the three of them were still so well-coordinated that he couldn't be sure of whittling them down before they made themselves and opening and dealt a deathblow.

And that was how he must have felt without considering the fact that Ashtoreth was slowly funneling [Bloodfire] into the brightly-glowing gauntlet on her left hand.

"Enough!" he screamed eventually. He rose into the air and flared his wings, making a decisive gesture with one of his claws.

The pyramid shook beneath them once more. A moment later, the sounds of violent explosions along its sloped sides reached Ashtoreth. She leapt into the air to get a better view and saw gold and bronze figures, likely golems, ripping their way out of the palace itself to move toward their position.

Past that, she could see that the rest of Alpha team had advanced to the palace and was engaged with another group of the darker golems from earlier.

You two go, she said. Try and keep those off me.

Nobody asked if Ashtoreth was sure. Hunter and Frost simply leapt into the air and flew down the slopes of the pyramid.

In case you wanted good news, Kylie's voice said in her head. I've got it.

Perfect, Ashtoreth said, standing on the battle-scarred surface of the pyramid and staring up at the floating dragon. Wait for my cue.

Mmhmm.

Ashtoreth was left standing on the battle-ruined surface, staring up the floating dragon.

Morax Tol let out another guttural laugh. "Poor little thing," he said. "It seems that to protect their weaker comrades, your humans have left you alone… with me."

He dove toward her, and she rushed across the top of the pyramid, avoiding him. "Oh yeah, lizard wizard?" she cried. "Well how about you try abjuring this!"

She spawned her novaheart in the air before her, bathing the world around them in violet light.

Only a few seconds before the whole of the palace would be bathed in spell-purging fire…

Morax Tol barked out a guttural laugh, loosed a volley of white firebolts aat Ashtoreth, then used the opening that he'd made as she dodged them to fly close to the novaheart. He held his claws in the air around her novaheart, so that it was almost like he was trying to grasp something that pushed against his hands.

Even as she twisted through the air to avoid his oncoming flames, Ashtoreth saw her chance, taking advantage of his momentarily split attention to launch her blade at him with a [Mighty Strike]...

The weapon connected with a barrier of white energy, harmlessly dispersing. At the same time, Morax Tol's throat began to glow with a bright white light as he spewed a column of fire directly onto the novaheart.

White light overtook the violet, and within a few moments Ashtoreth could feel that her novaheart had been completely snuffed out. The millions of [Bloodfire] it contained had simply vanished.

"Well fuck you then I guess," she said, reconjuring her blade as Morax Tol continued to laugh.

She did her best to look put out as she let out an enraged warcry and brandished her weapon before her.

The thing about dragons was that they were usually very intelligent and had excellent instincts. That meant that they were good at planning, improvising, and knowing when to attack and when to fall back.

A focused, emotionally stable dragon was very hard to bring down, not only because they were extremely powerful, but because they thought hard enough to know when they were being led into a trap.

But a dragon's emotional stability was so fragile that it was almost an illusion. Morax Tol had been free to loose spell after spell from the top of his pyramid, confident that he had many layers of defenses and support to call upon if he lost the upper hand.

In order to kill him, it was crucial that Ashtoreth make sure he had succumbed to the worst of his kind's weakness by the time those supporting layers had been peeled away. She'd served him frustration after frustration, layering in all of her own support to make sure he had constantly felt like he was one more spell, one more move away from taking victory and winning the ultimate prize.

How his eyes must have glittered with greed at the idea of becoming Monarch of Earth. What better reason was there to stay and fight, only running when he had no tricks left?

Here he stood, confident that he'd just dismantled her endgame, her intended finishing move, because through the eyes of a dragon, nothing could have made more sense: of course she'd always intended to kill him with her own massive, bombastic spell. He'd almost certainly realized what it was when she'd first conjured it and been planning to deal with it this entire time.

Stay close and look busy, she told Hunter. He was her exit strategy in case things went wrong.

She tried to look at least a little put out for Morax Tol's sake, but the truth was that while Ashtoreth would have preferred to have caught him flat-footed and taken the day before now, she was more than happy with this outcome.

Sure you're good? Hunter asked.

Oh yeah, she said, rolling her shoulders. I'm just gonna beat the shit out of him.

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