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Dimas had his hands full with the Blackburns on the third floor, but Asad seemed to be having the hardest time, forced to deal with Ismael, Nere, and Horatio all at once--probably the three strongest opponents after Melchor.

Hector broke into a full sprint as he cooked up the next strategy. Asad’s corner of the foyer blustered with flames and strings of targeted explosions, and Asad had to endure many of them in favor of dodging spatial distortions from Nere. It was clear enough that Asad needed some room to breathe. Perhaps another iron platform--

‘Shield above your head!’ Garovel yelled.

Hector brought the shield to bear in time for a swarm of mercurial spikes to break upon it, impacting with enough force to drop him on his ass. A spike skewered his left greave along with the leg therein. When the spikes subsided, he yanked the mercury out and clambered onto his right leg in order to limp onward while the other healed.

Before Hector could assist Asad, however, green light filled the chamber, and a veil of smoke washed past Horatio Blackburn, replacing the man’s body with a melting husk. Huge, snaking wisps of steam hissed off of Horatio’s vanishing clothes and boiling flesh. Even the man’s pan-forma-level regeneration was not enough to abate the Seadevil’s acid. Already, his limbs had been eaten through to the bone, dangling off of his torso like some kind of grotesque ornament and bringing him to his knees.

And Hector was abruptly glad that Lord Xuan was on their side.

The battle was clearly shifting in their favor now. With one less opponent to worry about, Asad was already getting in more shots of his own, pelting both Ismael and Nere with bursts of molten quartz and forcing them to give ground. His tattoos glowed an almost constant gold as he weathered Ismael’s violet flames in order to keep pressing his assault. Salvador, in the meantime, had already cleaned up the three opponents on his end and went crashing up to the third floor to assist Dimas.

‘Hold on,’ said Garovel. ‘Don’t jump back into the fight just yet.’

Hector stopped, uncertain. ‘Why not?’ From his position by the second floor’s staircases, he had a mostly clear view of everyone.

‘Let’s wait and see how things unfold. This battle might already be over. Be ready to jump in if and when you’re needed, but not before.’

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It was like watching a bull facing down a trio of wolves. The three Blackburns were attacking him in unison with minimal effectiveness, due to the Lord Delaguna’s passive defenses combined with his cobalt transfiguration. However, they did have one destruction user, who finally managed to hit Salvador’s metallic shoulder. Cobalt burst apart into a thousand brittle chips, but scarcely a moment passed before it regenerated, allowing Salvador to charge forward undeterred. The destruction user was forced to retreat sideways so that the other two Blackburns could buy him time to avoid being flattened.

Hector couldn’t tell if Salvador actually needed help or not, but he wasn’t going to wait and find out. He dove in shield-first and materialized a pillar beneath the destruction user, knocking the mustachioed man off balance. Hector swung his sword vertically, looking to lop the man’s arm off, but instead, the iron blade only cut partially through the armpit before snapping in half.

The man, whom he now recognized as Tomas Blackburn, did not look pleased. Tomas brought a meaty hand around to use his ability, and Hector wrenched away in time to lose an arm instead of his head. The heater shield endured a pummeling and went flying out of Hector’s shredded grasp.

Hector didn’t let the loss slow him down, though. He discarded his busted sword, wrapped his good arm around Tomas’ half-severed one, and pulled with all his strength. The appendage popped right off in a cloud of blood, and Hector clobbered Tomas in the face with the man’s own soul-strengthened bicep in one smooth motion. Tomas went toppling backward, and Hector moved to recover his shield, which had nearly finished restoring itself to perfect condition already.

When he looked back toward Lord Salvador, he found the man overpowering his two opponents. Tomas was scrambling back into position, but it was already too late. A huge hand found one of their heads and tore it off as if nothing had been holding it in place. The other Blackburn retreated, and when Tomas arrived again, Salvador put him through the wall.

‘Maybe we should help someone else,’ advised Garovel.

Hector looked around the foyer and saw that everyone was quite occupied, apart from him. The frenzied collision of smoke and liquid metal in the middle of the room made the very air shudder, but he couldn’t even remotely tell if one of them was winning.

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As Xuan eyed the apparent gunman, he burst into a laugh that had the deep rumble of a man thrice his size. “I’ve never had the honor--no, the pleasure--of meeting House Blackburn in real battle. And seeing as you’ve refused every chance at clemency, I hope--” He paused, perhaps to see if someone was going to shoot him again. “--I hope you won’t disappoint me. I haven’t had any good mayhem in a while, and I hate when my opponents die too quickly.”

That made Hector blink, along with everyone else in the room--including Melchor, Salvador, and even Dimas, the Seadevil’s own cousin.

They did not have long to be surprised, however.

Xuan and Duvoss chose that opportunity to converge. In an instant, the little Rainlord’s body disappeared within a column of white smoke, billowing up and out in a way unlike any smoke Hector had ever seen.

And chaos erupted. Gunfire rang out from all around, as did the piping reverberations of destruction users, and Hector decided that staying in one place was a bad idea.

‘Stay close to Asad,’ Garovel told him coolly.

Hector concurred. The lone Sandlord launched up to the second floor’s gallery amidst a flurry of bullets, explosions, and shattering quartz, and Hector followed.

Their first opponent, Hector recognized straight away. That was the face of Ismael Blackburn, Lord of Marshrock. The man’s file said his ability was potassium transfiguration, which now manifested in the violet flames leaping from Ismael’s body and shooting toward Asad like a volley of arrows.

Rather than stopping the flames with a wall, Asad doused them completely with a blanket of sand, allowing Hector to push closer with shield and materialized spear in hand.

Ismael severed a forearm and retreated, and Hector certainly did not need to be told why.

The shield took the explosion well, though the force still sent Hector flying. He grabbed the guardrail to catch himself, but it snapped right off and came with him, all the way to the other side of the chamber where his armored body left an impressive crack in the far wall.

For a second, he didn’t know where Garovel was, and then he realized that the reaper had somehow wriggled into his armor and latched onto his back. ‘Er--you okay in there?’

‘It’s actually quite cozy,’ said Garovel. ‘Wish I’d thought of this earlier. Careful on your right.’

Lord Salvador was there, dealing with three Blackburns all by himself.