A pillar of white light struck the Western Guardian, bathing the obsidian scales in a harsh glow and draining them of all color.

  By all conventional laws of magic, this should have been useless. Exorcisms were designed to break the connection between a spirit and the material plane, and the Guardian was as solid as a mountain, a creature of dense muscle, boiling blood, and volcanic heat. She was, perhaps, the most physical of all Guardians, representing the Body of the Greater Ritual.

  But Nick wasn't trying to actually exorcise her. He was simply taking advantage of the connection such a ritual would create.

  "Impure shapes," Nick shouted, his voice rasping over the roar of the volcano. "Return to dust."

  He poured his will into the Shard, forcing the [Gevurah] concept through the Onmyodo framework. In this case, Judgment would come in the form of limitations, the imposition of boundaries.

  Essentially, he was denying the Guardian's right to draw power from the dungeon, categorizing its link to the magma as a possession, while also stepping between the two.

  It wasn’t something he would have dared to try even just a month ago, but his soul was now much more resilient than his level suggested, and his experience dealing with demons had taught him a lot about handling esoteric mana interactions.

  The Guardian made a sound that was more like grinding stones than a cry, but it was still clearly a sign of pain.

  Violet sparks arced across her scales as the ritual took hold, creating a spiritual connection where none should have been.

  Nick felt the resistance immediately. It was like trying to lift a whale with a regular fishing line, and the enormous physical density of the "Body" aspect she embodied pressed down on his soul, threatening to snap the connection like a dry twig.

  It’s a good thing I don’t have to turn this into a tug-of-war. I wouldn’t have won against the other Guardians if I had been that reckless.

  Ironically, the thing that would let him win was also her greatest strength. Unlike the colossus, she had no hive mind to share the burden, no metaphysical link to rely on, and in the face of Judgment, standing alone was a weakness.

  Nick pushed harder, using his superior mana control to bypass a contest of strength he would definitely lose. Yeah, yeah, I know you have more mana than me, even now. It’s not going to help you.

  The connection to the Greater Ritual flickered as he fully slipped between the two, and Nick seized that moment of instability. He pushed his consciousness into the breach, following the mana lines that tethered the beast to the dungeon’s core, searching for the Anchor to break it.

  What he discovered nearly surprised him enough to let the magic fade, although his instincts were sharp enough to prevent it from truly happening.

  The leyline didn't end at a stone obelisk or a hidden rune like the other two Guardians' sites. Instead, it extended into the entire caldera, turning the magma rivers into sigils. The flowing lava inscribed a spell of constant renewal, providing the Guardian with endless vitality despite her inability to interact with it directly.

  But as Nick’s perception expanded through the network, he looked too deeply. He saw beyond the caldera, down into the ritual's depths, all the way to the Well at the dungeon's core.

  And something looked back.

  For a moment, the sulfur and fog dispersed. Nick stood in a dark, silent chamber of hewn stone.

  In the center of the room, a figure stood amidst a swirling vortex of mana so intense that even just looking at it made Nick feel nauseous.

  It was lupine, towering and broad-shouldered, standing on two legs with far more grace than the werewolves he had fought before. Its fur was a tangled patchwork of midnight black and brown, which might have made him think it was feral, but one look at its control of the mana told him it couldn’t be.

  It wore the tattered remnants of ceremonial robes and handled the surge of power from the damaged anchor with ease, not even seeming to strain despite the Greater Ritual threatening to collapse.

  Despite his initial impression, Nick thought it might have been a Wolfkin or maybe another lupine humanoid he didn’t recognize.

  Then the creature turned its head.

  The eyes were not the yellow, instinct-driven slits of a monster. They were burning violet, filled with a terrifying intelligence, and there was no madness there, only calculation.

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  Their eyes met, despite the great distance, and its lips peeled back to reveal very sharp fangs.

  A surge of pressure hit Nick’s mind, heavy enough to crush diamonds. It was the presence of a Prestige existence, a being that had gone beyond the mortal limits of the System.

  I see you, little thief, the presence seemed to whisper, not with words but with pure intent. It appeared amused rather than angry, which only increased Nick’s confusion.

  He didn’t have more time to come to terms with the situation as [Blasphemy] engaged, snapping the connection and freeing him from its grip. Recoiling physically, Nick stumbled back as if he’d been punched in the stomach, his heart pounding a frantic rhythm against his ribs.

  That was a werewolf, I’m sure of it, but one that went beyond the limits of the curse. I can’t even imagine what it’s capable of if it can handle such a wild flow of mana.

  Still, he had also noticed that the being was essentially stuck where it was. Whether because of his own actions, which had forced it to become a living anchor for the entire ritual, or because of whatever covert operation the Hones were conducting, he didn’t know, but the result was the same.

  Yeah, it wouldn’t have let things reach this point if it could have left the Well. And Calder wouldn’t have gotten so close if it had been able to leave freely.

  Shaking his head, he refocused on the Guardian. The short connection had allowed him to understand the anchor’s structure, and now he only needed to break it physically.

  "Raphael!" He roared, amplifying his voice with a gust of wind. "The lava! The rivers are the sigils! Cool them down!"

  "Cool the...?" Raphael hesitated just for a moment before understanding dawned. "Willow! Yvonne! Target the flows!"

  Nick didn't wait for them to start, trusting they would do their part, and slammed the butt of the Shard down again. "By the laws of the Northern Sky, I restrict thee!"

  What he did next was something that would have gotten him kicked out of any omnyodo clan, but since no one here could even follow what he was doing, much less understand its specifics, he abused the exorcism ritual without hesitation, twisting the mana flow to impose an ethereal quality onto the Guardian.

  Basically, he was reversing the conceptual order, transforming the beast into a spirit now that it was no longer linked to the greater ritual, and thus stopping it from affecting the physical world.

  The wurm roared in confusion as her claws passed through a rock she tried to crush. Her physical might, her greatest asset, was useless as she flickered out of phase with reality. She was grounded in the material world, but Nick’s Judgment forced her to play by spiritual rules.

  The dissonance tore at her, and she lunged for the magma, desperate to recharge and reassert her solidity.

  "Oh no, you don't," Nick snarled, sweeping his staff in a wide movement. “[Jet Stream].”

  For once, he didn't target the monster, since it would just pass through her. Instead, he aimed at the magma river she was reaching for, compressing the air, chilling it, and slamming into the molten rock.

  Hiss.

  The surface of the lava greyed, hardening into a crust of cooling basalt.

  Yvonne added her power, slamming [Glacial Wall] after [Glacial Wall] into the feeding tributaries. Willow manipulated the steam, transforming it into a blanket that drained the heat from the air.

  The caldera groaned, and slowly the flow of mana faltered, dimming the ritual's glowing veins as the magma hardened, and, with a sound like a falling landslide, the Anchor collapsed.

  The thick, oppressive mana of the Western Sector unraveled, its connection to the Core snapping violently, and sending a surge of energy rushing south toward the last stronghold.

  The Guardian fell to the ground as her intangibility faded when the ritual ended, and she became solid again. However, she was clearly weakened, and the aura of invincibility that had surrounded her disappeared without the volcano's immense power to sustain her.

  She was no longer a divine being; she was just a big lizard in a cooling bathtub.

  "Now!" Malik shouted, sensing the shift. He banged his spear against his shield, eagerly throwing himself down the ravine. "Get her!"

  The fog lost its grip and began to clear as the apprentices worked together to dispel it. The adventurers, after defeating the last Furnace Hound, gathered on the ridge.

  "Focus the fire on the head!" Raphael commanded, warping space to deflect a desperate stream of ash from the beast’s maw. "Don't let her recover!"

  Despite the many advantages they had gained and the severe weakening the Guardian had sustained, the subsequent battle was still a brutal grind.

  Nick stayed back, sweat dripping from his nose, his hands trembling slightly as he kept the Onmyodo circle steady. He couldn't join the attack without releasing the seals, and while it was possible that the dungeon wouldn’t try to reconnect, he couldn’t forget the amused malice in the Well Guardian’s eyes.

  Hold it, Nick told himself, watching Monte score a glowing line across the beast's flank with his rapier. Just hold it. They can do it.

  The Guardian fought with the desperation of a cornered queen. She thrashed, crushing rocks into powder, and snapped her jaws, catching Terence as he retreated too slowly, and cutting a chunk of his hand clean off.

  The young noble shouted, stumbling back as Tessa pulled him to the safety and healing of Willow, but the line held.

  They chipped away at her. A frost-crack here. A hammer blow there. Piece by piece, the obsidian armor fractured, revealing the glowing, molten flesh underneath.

  It took many minutes of exhausting combat. By the time she was flagging, the adventurers were bloody, the apprentices were running on fumes, and Nick’s mana reserves were dangerously low.

  "Now!" He shouted, seeing the opening. "She's trying to vent!"

  The Guardian reared back, her throat glowing white-hot as she prepared a final burst of breath.

  Raphael didn't let the opening go unpunished. He thrust both hands forward, his face twisted with effort. "[Spatial Distortion: Loop]!"

  Unlike his previous attempts, which targeted her entire body and only caused discomfort due to the sheer density of her reserves, this spell took effect just before her, bypassing her natural resistance.

  The breath of superheated plasma burst from her lungs, but instead of leaving her mouth, it hit the warped space and looped back on itself.

  The Guardian barely had time to realize something was very wrong before her skull expanded and ruptured, showering the caldera in shards of black bone and superheated brain matter. The massive body stood for a moment, swaying like a felled tree, before crashing down into the hardening lava.

  The ground shook one last time, then went still.

  Nick released the ritual, slumping against his staff as his legs turned to jelly. For several long seconds, he just stared at the corpse as his mind replaying the vision of the violet eyes in the dark.

  “God damn it,” Terence cursed, chugging what looked like a very expensive elixir to restore the missing part of his hand.

  I have the strange feeling that the next fight won’t be any easier.

  45+ chapters: