The final door didn't open so much as it yawned, pulling at the water around her with a sudden greedy suction. Akiko had only a heartbeat to brace before it dragged her forward, claws scraping sparks across the threshold.

She tumbled through into open air, the water sluicing off her in streaming coils. Below, a cavernous expanse waited, lit by shifting columns of pale light filtering down through dozens of cascading waterfalls that ringed the arena's walls.

Akiko twisted midair, foxfire flaring at her wrists and ankles. The sudden bloom of force slowed her descent, searing the damp air in a spiral that left her landing hard but upright on the narrow strip of stone circling the pool.

She exhaled sharply, tail snapping for balance. The space was vast, bigger than any other chamber, its ceiling lost in gloom. Water thundered down from every side, feeding the central pool with frothing currents that almost seemed to breathe.

A second splash echoed above, then a rippling dome of light smashed into the stone beside her. Raya landed inside, her barriers catching the last of her momentum in a gentle shimmer. The shield popped a beat later, leaving her standing in her pressure suit, a grin ghosting across her face under the helmet.

"Show off," Akiko muttered, but there was no heat in it. Just raw, electric relief at having Raya back at her side.

Her claws flexed on the trident's shaft. Now that they were in open air, no longer submerged where the water-aspect focus was essential, it felt awkward, weighty. Her mining laser was already warming at her side, regulators pulsing a slow, eager rhythm against her foxfire core.

She glanced at Raya. Then without ceremony, she tossed the trident in a short underhand arc.

Raya caught it awkwardly, nearly fumbling it before bracing it across her chest. Her head tilted just slightly, shoulders lifting in the universal really?

Akiko just grinned, sharp and breathless. "Figure it might still be handy. Keep the pointy end forward."

"Great," Raya drawled, dry even through her helmet filters. "I've always wanted to juggle oversized forks."

Together they turned to the pool.

Something stirred beneath the surface. A slow, vast distortion, as if the water itself was deciding to change shape. Dark limbs uncoiled, trailing bioluminescent filaments that flickered like stars caught in deep tide. A kraken.

It rose inch by inch, slick hide breaking the surface in silent, unstoppable arcs. Tentacles the width of Akiko's torso draped over the stone lip, clutching for purchase. Each movement displaced enough water to send small waves lapping against her boots.

Foxfire crawled up Akiko's shoulders in thin, hungry lines. Her pulse kicked through her veins, every instinct screaming for motion.

Alright, she thought, flexing her claws, let's see if this thing wants to dance.

Tentacles uncoiled from the pool like dark rivers, slick with churning mana. They writhed across the water's surface, then reached, testing the stone rim with cautious, ponderous intent. Each limb ended in a cluster of suckers that rippled with eerie bioluminescent pulses, reading the space like blind, hungry eyes.

The first strike was sudden, a tentacle whipping across the stone with shocking speed. Akiko lunged sideways, foxfire detonating in a sharp microburst that turned her dodge into a violent slide. She hit the ground, claws tearing shallow gouges to slow herself.

Another tentacle slammed down where she'd been. The impact cracked stone, sending up shards that scattered into the pool. The kraken tilted, limbs shifting.

Akiko braced, tail lashing for balance. She slammed her laser forward, foxfire surging down her arm into the regulators. A focused beam erupted from the aperture, cutting the air in a blue-white line. It sheared across one limb, scoring deep enough to send up a twisting geyser of dark ichor.

The kraken convulsed, tentacles retracting, then lashing out in a wild net that forced her back.

Akiko skidded to a halt near Raya. Her chest heaved with exhilarated breaths. Her grin was sharp and unhinged.

"You're enjoying this," Raya muttered, dry despite the strain in her shoulders.

Akiko's ears twitched back. "I've spent the last few hours getting kicked around by water. About time it played fair."

The kraken surged again. This time three tentacles came at once, one low to trip her, two from above like coordinated mauls. Akiko braced, and Raya stepped forward, palm out. A dome snapped into place just as the limbs crashed down.

The force of the blow vibrated through the barrier. Cracks spiderwebbed, but didn't break.

Raya let out a grunt, pushing outward. The barrier flexed, throwing the limbs off with a shudder that made the kraken hesitate.

At first, the kraken's strikes were easy enough to track, limbs rising from the pool, or uncoiling along the stone rim. Akiko could read them, meet them with laser bursts and foxfire cuts, her feet finding purchase even on slick stone.

But then the water changed.

The kraken pulled something deeper from the pool. A resonance that made the surface shudder, rippling outward to catch the waterfalls that ringed the cavern. Each cascading stream twisted, folding in on itself, then split like peeled muscle.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Tentacles poured out of the waterfalls. Slick and impossible, they punched through reality in silent lunges, aiming for her shoulders, her back, the soft curve under her ribs.

Akiko twisted away with a snarling gasp, foxfire detonating at her hips to flip her backward. Another limb surged out of the sheet of water crashing over the far wall, slamming across her shoulder. She spun wildly, pain bright and wet under her armor.

Her mining laser barked in reflex, a searing beam that cut one limb in half. But three more replaced it, reaching from the sheets of splashing water as the kraken churned the pool, forcing sprays into the air, new thresholds for its limbs to emerge.

Akiko shot forward with a desperate vector, claws scoring molten lines through a limb that tried to catch her by the ankle. Another tentacle caught her square across the back and threw her bodily across the arena, her shield flaring bright.

She hit the stone hard, bounced, rolled. Foxfire sputtered under the impact, her core stuttering with pain.

Somewhere through the haze, she heard Raya's voice.

"Akiko!"

She forced herself up on one knee, coughing, foxfire flaring in nervous, scattered lines.

Raya stood a few meters back, trident awkwardly braced against her shoulder. Her barriers flared as two tentacles smashed down, fracturing across the light. She tried to turn the trident, aiming it at a nearby surge of water. The mana inside pulsed, but nothing happened.

"Figure it out!" Akiko yelled. Another tentacle swept in low, and she flung herself sideways with a ragged blast of foxfire from her shoulders.

"Working on it!" Raya shouted back, voice raw with focus.

Akiko hit the ground again, skidding on her side. Her claws dug in, tail lashing wildly for balance. She bared her teeth in a grin that was all blood and mania.

Alright, she thought. If you want me moving, I'll move.

She surged up, foxfire exploding under her feet, propelling her in a reckless arc over two reaching limbs. Another tentacle tried to catch her midair. She twisted with a scream of her mining laser, vaporizing it in a flash of superheated air.

Then she slammed down on the other side of the pool, knee buckling awkwardly, pain flaring through her thigh where one of the dungeon's earlier traps had cut her deep.

Still standing. Still fighting.

Raya's second attempt with the trident nearly lost it. The mana surged too abruptly, sending a pulse that almost ripped the weapon from her hands. But her disruption held, and the surge caught two tentacles just as they lunged through cascading water. The flow twisted wrong, the limbs severed at the threshold with wet pops, vanishing back into the waterfalls in ragged, twitching stumps.

The kraken reared, a violent shudder passing through its massive form. The water around it churned with red-dark clouds.

"That's it!" Akiko barked, even as her voice rasped with raw exhaustion. "Disrupt the thresholds! Keep it—"

But the water changed again.

All at once, the kraken pulled everything inward. The waterfalls that had once been doorways to its attacks reversed, streams bending against gravity to surge into the pool. The surface bubbled and shrank as it drank in every drop, building pressure into a dense core at the base of its maw.

Akiko's stomach dropped. The kraken tilted toward Raya, its remaining tentacles coiling for stability.

"Raya—!"

Raya braced the trident across her chest, barriers rippling out. It might hold, she'd seen them turn aside beams before, but not under this much strain, not something at this level. She couldn't risk it. One bad angle, one flicker in the flow, and the barrier would fail.

The thought hit like a gut-punch. Better me than her. Always.

Her foxfire flared in a brutal spike, legs coiling. She launched herself across the stone, a single blast of her Pulse Vector spellform scouring the floor behind her as she launched forward, landing between Raya and the kraken.

The beam fired.

Water compressed to an impossible density screamed out in a narrow jet, fracturing the air as it went. Akiko slammed her feet down, tail lashing for balance, claws digging into stone. Her foxfire surged into the mining laser, amplifiers catching it and shaping it into a burning lance of blue-white.

Applied Spellform: Foxfire Pulse Vector (Tier II) — Channeling through [Modified Mining Laser]

The two beams met in the center of the arena.

The water carved forward in slicing rings. The foxfire boiled it on contact, twisting it into expanding clouds of vapor. The clash pushed Akiko back inch by inch, her arms shaking with the force, mining laser regulators blinking urgent warnings.

Her teeth bared in a snarl.

Not today.

She pulled harder, dredging every last drop of mana from her battered core. Foxfire roared, the beam thickening, edges flaring out like petals of a violent flower. With a final, snarled exhale, she drove it forward. The foxfire cut through the water jet, pierced the gathered mana at the kraken's throat, and exploded out its far side in a burst of scorched ichor.

The kraken convulsed. Tentacles flailed, breaking stone, then collapsed all at once into the pool with a dull, wet thunder.

Akiko swayed. Her vision wavered, edges dark with pain and hollow mana void. Her knees buckled.

But she didn't fall far. Arms wrapped around her from behind, catching her weight. Raya's breath was a ragged whisper in her ear, warm even through the helmet. "I've got you. It's dead. I've got you."

Akiko let her head tip back, cheek brushing Raya's shoulder. A short, breathless laugh escaped her.

"Next time," Raya murmured, voice shaking with adrenaline and relief, "just stand behind the damn barrier."

Akiko's grin was weary but wild. Her tail twitched once, foxfire leaking around it like the last flare of a dying star.

The kraken's body sank slowly, the water reclaiming it in swirling eddies that still pulsed faintly with residual mana. The arena was quiet now, save for the soft thunder of the waterfalls ringing them.

Akiko sagged forward, bracing her palms on her knees. Her core ached, foxfire leaking in uneven flickers that felt more like nervous twitches than real power. Each breath was a shallow pull that barely reached her ribs.

Raya stepped close, one hand pressing gently to Akiko's back. Even through the armor weave, the touch was cool, threaded with subtle magic that soothed the worst spikes of pain.

"You need to rest," Raya murmured, voice low but firm. "Sit. Give me ten minutes to mend some of this."

Akiko didn't argue. The last of her tension drained out with a tired exhale. Her tail drooped low, claws flexing once against the ground before she settled to a crouch.

"Yeah," she breathed. "Alright. Ten."

Raya knelt behind her, hands steady as they moved across battered muscle and cracked mana channels. Each small pulse of healing threaded through Akiko like cool silk, chasing out the lingering fire of the fight.

Akiko let her eyes slip half-closed. Almost let her weight lean back into Raya's palms. Almost.

It was stupid how much she'd wanted this. To just stop for a moment. To let Raya fuss, to feel hands on her that weren't trying to tear her apart.

Ten minutes passed too quickly. When Raya finally pulled back, Akiko's skin still hummed where the magic had touched her. She gave Raya a small, grateful grin.

"Better," she said.

"Try not to undo all my hard work in the next five steps," Raya shot back, but her eyes were soft.

Akiko stood and stretched, tail giving a low twitch.

The central pool shimmered now, its surface a perfect, glassy threshold rippling with water-aspected mana. The same kind of portal that had brought them here.

Akiko drew in a slow breath. "Ready?"

"Not even a little," Raya muttered. Then she tilted her head, smiling faintly. "But lead on."

They stepped into the pool together. The mana met them in a cool rush, folding around their shoulders, creeping up over their heads. For a moment, Akiko felt weightless. Then it closed over her head and the world went bright and strange.

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