The chaos started faster than Greg could handle. One minute they were standing on the platform trying to talk to weapons that could think for themselves, and the next they were running away from a storm of animated metal that had gone crazy. A spear whistled past his ear so close that he could feel the air move, and he threw himself sideways without thinking.

"Lylia, lead the way!" Greg yelled over the noise of metal hitting metal and angry weapon screams. "Elwen, give me the shield and stay with Hilda!"

Elwen takes off her armguard to throw it toward Greg, who starts to wear it. "Veldway, which way to the door?!"

Veldway's sword was a blur of movement that blocked attacks with as little movement as possible and as much efficiency as possible. Even though there was violence all around him, he looked strangely calm, almost like he was thinking.

"Thirty degrees northeast, about forty meters. The portal looks like a vertical distortion in the fabric of space. You will know it when you see it because it looks like reality is folding in on itself."

Greg said, "That's really helpful and not scary at all," as he activated Elwen's Guardian's Oath.

The shield appeared just in time to stop a hammer that would have crushed his head. The impact pushed him back, and his feet scraped against the stone, but the shield stayed strong.

A sword construct dove at Elwen from above, its blade shining with anger. With one hand, she pulled Hilda to the side, and with the other, she pointed sharply, calling forth thick vines that burst through the cracks in the platform.

The vines wrapped around the sword in the middle of the dive, and the plant magic she had been practicing for years came through when it mattered most. The sword thrashed around violently, cutting through the vines, but it gave them a few extra seconds.

"Get in my pocket, Hammy!" Elwen told the slime to do something, and it did right away, squeezing itself and the compass into her coat pocket with a muffled chirp.

Elwen couldn't help Hilda and protect the slime simultaneously, so she prioritized Hilda's needs at that moment. Hilda was having a difficult time staying awake.

The silver marks had spread to cover almost half of her body, and it looked like every step she took was difficult. Her breathing was fast and shallow, and her skin was pale except for the glowing circuit-like patterns.

"I can do it," she said when Elwen tried to help her, but her legs were shaking so badly that no one believed her.

Lylia cut through the weapons that were attacking her with deadly speed. She used textbook Royal Knight sword techniques, making sure that every strike was meant to disable rather than kill when she could.

An axe flew at her from the left. She turned and used its speed against it, sending it into a spear that was coming at her from the right. When the two structures hit each other, there was a loud clang, and they both fell, stunned for a moment.

"I see it!" she yelled back. "The door! It's as scary as they said it would be!"

Greg took a brief look ahead and knew right away what she meant. The world around him seemed to bend and twist into a vertical line about eight feet tall, which made his eyes hurt.

He could see the dark stone hallways they had first entered through the distortion. That was their way out. They only had to get there through an army of weapon constructs that were getting more and more aggressive.

"Veldway!" Greg yelled. "Can you call them off? You made them!"

"I'm working on it!" For the first time, real anger crept into Veldway's voice. "They're going against my orders."

"The emotional conflict between protecting me and following my orders is making their behavior matrices go in circles. They're basically all having a panic attack at once!"

"Can weapons even get panic attacks?! That sounded dumb!" Elwen asked in disbelief, which helped Hilda avoid a dagger that was flying low.

"These ones can. I might have made their emotional structure too complicated." Veldway's sword blocked three attacks in a row rapidly. "Looking back, the problem looks like a design flaw."

"Oh! You think about that right now!?" Greg's shield took another giant hit, this time from a mace that looked like it wanted to turn him into paste.

The Guardian's Oath took in the kinetic energy, but he could feel the strain. The shield could only do so much, and they were pushing it to its limits.

They fought their way forward, one meter at a time. Greg lost count of how many weapons they had to avoid, deflect, or disable.

He could see that Lylia was also exhausted from working on the shield all the time. His arms were on fire.

Veldway was the only one who didn't seem too bothered. His movements were still precise and efficient, even in the middle of the chaos.

Twenty meters away from the door. Fifteen. Ten.

A giant cleaver, at least six feet long, fell from above like a guillotine blade. Greg saw it too late to get out of the way. His shield was still recovering from the last block, and for a moment he knew he was going to be cut in half.

Veldway's hand shot out, with fingers spread out. The cleaver stopped falling and stayed in place because of an unseen force.

"Telekinesis isn't good for fighting," Veldway said in a casual tone, as if they weren't in any real danger. "Too much focus needed, but sometimes helpful in keeping friends from dying."

"Thanks for that," Greg said as he rushed forward. The word "friends" hung in the air for a moment, and even though everything was going wrong, Greg felt a small wave of warmth. Veldway had said they were friends. Progress.

Five meters. Three. They were almost there.

Then the warhammer that had spoken first stepped right in front of them. It stood in front of them and the portal, and the weight of its presence made the platform crack.

"Nobody gets to pass!" it growled, and its grinding voice was full of real pain. "Master's safety is the most important thing! Portals lead to trouble... and unacceptable means not acceptable!!!"

"Yes," Veldway said, and his voice was softer now. "But I still have to go. That's what friends are for. They put themselves in danger for each other."

"Unacceptable," the warhammer said again, but Greg could hear the doubt creeping in.

Veldway said, "Sometimes life is not ideal, but we live it anyway. Let us go... Please."

For a moment, everything was up in the air. Then, slowly and with great reluctance, the warhammer moved aside. "If Master dies, I'll find a way to follow him and be very upset with him."

"That's fair," Veldway said.

They jumped through the portal. It felt like being turned inside out and then back again, but it happened in the time between heartbeats.

Greg fell out on the other side, and his speed carried him forward until he hit a weapon rack. The old wood broke apart when it hit him, and he fell into a pile of broken shelves and dusty training swords.

He stood up and pushed debris off himself, calling out, "Everyone through?" His whole body hurt.

"Here," Lylia said, helping Hilda through the door.

Lylia had to catch the miner before she fell to the ground right away. The silver marks were flashing so quickly that they looked like strobe lights.

"Hilda needs to see a healer if we arrive in Meridian!"

Greg promised, "We'll get it to her," but he had no idea how they would do that with a Calamity coming down on Meridian. One problem at a time.

Elwen came next, looking messy but fine. Hammy stuck its head out of her pocket and chirped angrily, as if to say it didn't like being used as pocket cargo.

"Are we okay?" Elwen wanted to know.

"Relatively," Veldway said, coming out of the portal last.

A sound like a sigh of relief sealed the distortion behind him. "Now that I've left, the pocket dimension should be stable."

"Eventually, the weapons will calm down and go back to their patrol patterns. Give or take a few hours of leftover agitation."

"Do we have a few hours?" Greg asked in a direct way.

"No. If the Calamity keeps going at the same speed, I think it will reach Meridian's outer districts in about ninety minutes. It will be less if it speeds up." Veldway was already going deeper into the building, moving through the hallways with the ease of someone who knew every inch of it.

"Come with me."

"I need to get things together for the Resonance Hammer."

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