The front was already drowning in monsters when our unit arrived.

  A Cockatrice darted between prisoners, it was a twisted mockery of a rooster with dragon scales and a serpent's tail.

  It spat a stream of acid that caught a man mid-swing.

  His arm melted to the elbow, armor and flesh merging together like wax.

  His scream cut off as the beast snapped the man's head in its beak crushing it like a grape, blood and acid dripped to the floor in a sizzle.

  "Keep moving!" Kaz shouted, his voice carrying without effort over the chaos.

  Ghouls poured from a nearby tear in packs, their gray skin stretched tight over their bodies. Their claws found flesh with surgical precision, tearing through armor like it was paper. A woman to my left went down under three of them, her throat opened in a fountain of blood before she could even scream.

  I felt my stomach knot as a swarm of skeletons crashed against a defensive line fifty meters ahead. They had no fear, no hesitation, just the click-clack of bone on bone and the wet sounds of their weapons finding meat.

  "On me, you worthless wretches!" Kaz's Origin flared brighter, turning him into a beacon in the chaos. Golden light poured from his skin, his eyes turning into twin suns that burned away any shadows.

  Something massive moved in the distance, the shapes were too large to identify through the chaos, silhouettes against the tear-light that pulsed in the sky.

  My worms stirred beneath my skin, responding to the proximity of flesh, of energy, of food. The hunger rose like a tide, whispering promises of strength if I'd just let go, just feed, just consume.

  I pushed it down.

  "Fish!" Kaz's voice snapped my attention back. "You're with Zo. Keep your constructs tight and controlled."

  "There are roughly fifteen beasts approaching from the northern tear. They look like a man and a hyena did the unspeakable… Oh and they have really sharp weapons." Mabel's voice slithered through my mind.

  I barely had time to process her warning before the first Gnoll charged into view.

  It was seven feet of muscle and matted fur, its hyena head thrown back in a horrible cackling laugh that sounded almost human. It held a crude axe high, and was flanked by fourteen others.

  My constructs formed faster than ever, blade on one arm, partial exoskeleton across my torso.

  I met the first Gnoll's axe with my worm-blade, the impact shuddering through me, then with my encased hand I gripped its throat and pulled hard tearing muscle and sinew out.

  Blood sprayed hot across my face, my tongue traced my lips tasting the hot blood, as the hunger surged again.

  The worms beneath my skin were practically foaming their little spiral mouths.

  The combat collapsed into pure chaos.

  My world shrank to the immediate surroundings.

  The Gnoll lunging for my throat, the pack trying to flank me.

  The training with Mabel kicked in. I didn't think about my movements; the worms reacted before conscious thought, forming shields against the incoming strikes, and hardening beneath the skin when claws raked across my chest.

  Zo fought nearby, her cyan hair whipping as she moved.

  I watched as a Gnoll's club crashed into her, and she laughed; it was a sound of pure joy as she absorbed the kinetic energy.

  Her Origin flared, and she released it in a devastating counter that sent three Gnolls flying, their bodies breaking apart in an explosion of gore.

  She controlled the tempo, she was overwhelming, seducing the fight itself into her rhythm.

  Kaz was a sun. His golden axes encased with flames that seared flesh, he turned the hyena-men to ash before they could scream.

  He advanced slowly, methodically, an unstoppable force that created a zone of safety behind him.

  An alpha Gnoll emerged from the back of the pack… it was larger than the others.

  It had a long scar across its muzzle, and wielded an axe that looked like it had been forged from the skull of an ogre. It rallied its pack with a howl that raised the hair on my arms.

  I watched the other Gnolls straighten, their eyes glazing with berserker rage.

  "The alpha can empower its underlings," Mabel observed. "Kill it first or this gets substantially more difficult."

  A Gnoll slipped past my guard, its claws raking across my side, breaking through my hastily-formed exoskeleton.

  The pain flared hot and immediate. My worms rushed to repair the damage, consuming my own energy to regenerate. The hunger screamed louder.

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  I gritted my teeth and kept fighting.

  The pack alpha fixed its yellow eyes on me, seeing weakness, seeing blood. It charged, axe raised.

  I let it come.

  At the last moment I created a whip-like tendril of jagged bone-worms. It snapped towards the alpha, wrapping its weapon arm, and yanking it off-balance.

  My blade punched through its chest, the worms surging forward, their sharp little mouths ripping through flesh, bone and muscle… draining and consuming energy from still-living flesh.

  I let out a roar of triumph, fighting to stay present, to not lose myself in the frenzy.

  The alpha's eyes widened in shock, then dimmed.

  Its body went limp on my blade.

  The remaining Gnolls broke and scattered, their morale shattered with their leader.

  I stood over the corpse, worms retracting, and breathing hard.

  "Acceptable," Mabel said, which from her was practically a standing ovation.

  "Push forward!" Kaz called, his golden light cutting through the smoke and chaos. "We hold this position!"

  I wiped blood from my face, reformed my blade, and moved to rejoin the formation.

  This was just the beginning.

  Time lost meaning in combat.

  Had we been fighting for minutes? Hours? The sky above us was torn open, multiple tears bleeding different colors, casting everything in sickly, shifting light.

  My constructs had been reformed dozens of times, blades, armor, whips. Each iteration was faster than the last. My body moved on instinct now, worms reacting to threats before my conscious mind registered them.

  A new tear ruptured fifty meters to our left. Massive wolves the size of horses burst through with intelligent, malicious eyes. They moved with coordination that spoke of something more than animal instinct.

  One of the wolves—the leader, its fur streaked with gray—threw back its head and howled commands to the others. The sound wasn't animal; it was words in a guttural tongue that made my skin crawl.

  Kaz intercepted the pack leader. The beast tried to dodge, to find an angle. Kaz didn't give it one. Flames caught it mid-leap, and the wolf-thing died screaming in agony.

  The worms sensed something on my right, sending a tingling sensation.

  I spun, my blade already forming, and caught a wolf mid-leap with the tip of my sword. The blade sank deep into its chest, but momentum carried both of us backward.

  We hit the ground hard, the beast's weight crushing the air from my lungs. Its jaws snapped inches from my face, its hot breath reeking of corpses.

  Zo was there in an instant, her fist connecting with the monster's skull.

  There was a wet crack, and the beast went limp. She pulled it off me, grinning wildly, blood streaking her face.

  "You getting slow, Fish? That was sloppy."

  "Just giving you something to do," I gasped, getting to my feet.

  Her laugh was bright and sharp against the backdrop of battle. "There's plenty to do without you playing the damsel."

  The ground beneath us trembled.

  "Move!" Mabel's voice was sharp with fear.

  Without thinking twice I grabbed Zo's arm and yanked her back, just as the earth exploded where she'd been standing.

  Three meters of armored centipede burst upward, mandibles dripping with venom.

  Its segmented body spiraled as it fixed on us, then lunged for a group of prisoners a few meters away.

  Three people were gone in the blink of an eye, ripped apart.

  The centipede dragged a fourth underground, her screams fading as the earth swallowed her.

  There were more eruptions around us, the ground becoming as dangerous as the air. Prisoners screamed, caught between the monsters above and the horrors below.

  I scanned the battlefield, trying to make sense of the chaos.

  The tears kept opening. The beasts kept coming.

  This wasn't a battle we could win, we were all going to die…

  Curtis's voice boomed across the front, his retreat orders echoed throughout the remaining units.

  Retreating would be difficult. Our reality was complete chaos, prisoners scattered and ran in every direction, the beasts pursuing them, cutting off all paths of retreat.

  "Fish, stay close!" Zo called, backing toward our fallback position.

  I moved to follow, and saw the woman with snake-scale patches across her throat.

  A beast had her, its image shimmering a meter from its actual location as its tentacles wrapped around her throat.

  I moved toward her, but Zo pulled me back.

  "It's too late for her!"

  I could only watch as the tentacles tightened.

  The woman stopped struggling as she was pulled apart, the skin of each limb stretching and tearing like dough, her blood spraying across the battlefield.

  I had to look away, as bile began to rise in my throat.

  Our unit reached the rally point which formed a natural chokepoint between the rock formations.

  Kaz had blocked off the monsters, his flames burning brightly, creating a barrier of fire the beasts seemed reluctant to cross.

  "Whats the status report," Kaz demanded, scanning what remained of our unit.

  "We lost eight," someone called. "Fourteen wounded."

  I leaned against a rock, trying to catch my breath. My body ached from exertion, from wounds that had already closed, from the constant drain of using my Origin.

  I could feel the changes in my body, the way the worms responded more quickly, and formed more precisely.

  I was becoming something else, something more than human, with every death around me.

  Beyond Kaz's wall of flames, the beasts prowled back and forth, waiting, watching, testing it for weakness.

  It was a moment of safety that wouldn't last long.

  As if on cue a tear split directly within our little sanctuary.

  The air cracked with a sound of ice breaking over a frozen lake, and undead soldiers poured through, they had ancient armor hanging from desiccated flesh, weapons that had tasted blood centuries before any of us were born.

  Kaz didn't hesitate.

  He charged into the midst of them, his golden axes blazing like twin suns. "Regroup! Don't let them break our ranks!" he shouted.

  His axes and flames met the undead resilience.

  While Kaz was occupied, the wall of fire weakened.

  Beasts that had been held at bay began finding gaps in our defense.

  "We can't hold!" someone shouted.

  Curtis's voice echoed throughout the front again… he wanted all units to converge on the fortress's central defensive position. All bridges, all survivors.

  Kaz finished the last undead,his flames cremating the monster.

  "Fall back, you heard the order! Fish, Zo, take point. Everyone else, maintain formation!"

  I found myself near the front, Zo beside me, Sophie appearing and disappearing on our rear like a bloody ghost.

  Her crimson constructs cut through the beasts that tried to intercept us, her pale blue-grey eyes cold and focused.

  We found Bridge One's survivors mid-retreat.

  Sadie was unmistakable, her radiance turned her into a beacon of white light, her weapons of light forming and reforming as she covered her unit's withdrawal.

  She fought like she was conducting a symphony… brutal, beautiful, perfectly controlled.

  Rafe was right next to her. His quickstep made him a blur.

  He wasn't as visually overwhelming as Kaz or Sadie, but his efficiency was on par. Nothing touched him. Nothing came close. Between attacks, he was helping wounded prisoners move, his warm voice cutting through their panic.

  "Stay with me," he was saying to a limping man. "Just a little further. You can make it."

  The two groups merged.

  Kaz and Sadie were exchanging information. When I felt something shift in the air.

  I looked up at the largest tear on the horizon. It was growing. Spreading and consuming the other tears.

  I could see something massive moving behind it.

  "Kaz," I called, pointing. "What the fuck is that?"

  He followed my gaze, his golden light dimming slightly. For the first time since I'd met him, I saw something like fear cross his face.

  "Run," he said simply. "Everyone run!"