Time slowed to a crawl.
Elias fell from above with the sun burning along the edge of his greatsword.
Jason's Thunderbolt gathered beneath the Alpha's ruined flank, compressed into a single point of blue-white judgment.
Marcus stood between them and the monster, shield cracked, body trembling, breath burning in his chest as he held the Rampager's attention for one impossible heartbeat longer.
The Crystalhide Rampager stared at death coming for it from two directions.
Then its eyes changed.
Blue became red.
Not slowly.
Not gradually.
All four eyes ignited at once, burning crimson from the center outward until the cold glow that had filled them before was swallowed by something hotter, uglier, and far more violent. The blue veins beneath its hide flared, ruptured in color, and turned into living red lines that spread through its body like molten lightning trapped under stone.
The crystals across its armor answered.
