Both Laurence and Yveth looked on in distress, their plans falling apart before their eyes. Laurence knew that it would take millennia to collect enough wish power to perform the ritual again, and he was willing to wait, but he was not sure if the well itself would be able to survive that long. He was not sure whether the room would even be intact by the end of the ritual. All he knew was that gawayen had stood in the way of him reviving Cleo too many times. Now it was time for him to avenge himself.
As Laurence stared at Gawayen and set his weapon at his side, Yveth crept closer to the doorway. She could see that both men were determined to fight until only one was left standing and thought it was in her best interests to be kept as far out of it as possible. She was also beginning to have concerns about the state of the dimensional pocket that they were in. People told tales of those that fell into the void, how most never returned, and how those that did seemed to be the unlucky ones. They were changed. Broken by the emptiness, or perhaps by whatever else was out there.
None of that was ideal for Yveth. As a precaution, she edged herself back to the entrance as quietly as possible. This was made easier by the fact that two pools of energy were swelling in the area. One was in Gawayen’s core as the wish he made energised him, while the other was at the tip of Laurence’s weapon.
As both men became wholly consumed by their actions, the mana within the room dropped to levels so low that the aged air became stagnant. Yveth turned round and focussed on the doorway in front of her. Things were even more urgent than she realised. Cracks were spreading across the doorway at a speed visible to the naked eye, and with Laurence absorbing all the ambient mana in the room to give Gawayen one last middle finger for obstructing him from reviving his love, there was no way for the pocket dimension to repair itself.
Space began to drift apart, causing the thin cracks to widen and expose more of the void. If Yveth was not careful, then the entry to the room would be devoured by the void and she would be trapped. Taking a deep breath, she slipped around the cracks that had now spread most of the way across the door in thin lines. Even though she had tried to pass as deftly as possible, several of the cracks still managed to spread as she was twisting through and nicked her arms and legs, leaving gaps in her flesh as a gift.
Laurence took in another breath and the entrance to the pocket dimension collapsed entirely, sealing both Gawayen and himself in. Unbidden, the blue light that existed just below his skin began pooling in his eyes and he began to see the future and the past that had lead him to this point. He saw every action in his life that had led him here, and at the same time he saw every single outcome of his next strike, but after that he saw nothing. There was only void.
Smiling, he let out that deep breath he had been holding as the very altar that Gawayen floated above began to crack. The pressure of the void and Laurence’s ravenous plundering of mana was too much for it to bear, and now it was crumbling apart. His hip dropped slightly as the blue light in his eyes dimmed, before passing through his body and joining the light on the tip of the blade that capped his hammer. The light grew and grew, before shrinking down to the size of a mote and vibrating incessantly. The space it tracked through began to warp, causing the cracks to spread even further. Finally, Laurence cried out, “Astaroth,” for the second time. He pushed his weapon forwards, towards Gawayen, with complete focus. There was no chance of distraction this time.
The beam of light cut through the air and struck the light pillar protecting Gawayen. For a moment, the green light held up against the blue, but even as it felt the light back it began to fade. In less than the blink of an eye, the light shattered and Laurence's attack pierced his nemesis.
For a moment, Gawayen was shocked. His body was sinking through the torn space left behind by Lawrence's strike, flesh splitting seamlessly in the process. He tried to grab hold of himself, to pull his body back together, but as the invisible line broke through his shoulder, he lost all traction with his left arm.
“No! No no no! You can’t do this!” He cried as the motes of green light fluttered off into the void. “I was going to be eternal!” His body landed back on the altar and there was a crunch. He was the man that broke the camel’s back, as underneath him the altar dissolved into nothing, leaving him to fall into the void alone. With his right arm, he grabbed hold of his now useless left and tore it off his body. Blood pumped out of his wound like a broken faucet as he swung the arm through the air, ripping a hole in the void, revealing that same bone pathway and transforming every bone that used to be part of the left side of his torso into dust. With his now freed right hand he tried to grab at the opening with the hope that he could escape. He grabbed a bone jutting out from the floor, but as the blood continued to pump out of his chest his grip slackened. His fingers began slipping as he could no longer keep up the strength required in order to pull himself to safety. His fingers lost contact and he fell away from his escape route.
Laurence watched on with grim satisfaction before sitting down and looking around him. There was nothing he could do to repair the damage done to the pocket dimension, or the altar, but as he thought about that final strike and the moments that led up to it, he decided that his situation did not matter. He had seen something. Within the moment that he had ruined Gawayen’s chances, he had grasped hold of an idea. It was foolish to call it a plan, because it was barely formed, but it was more than he had left.
He smiled as he looked into the void that was consuming everything around him. There were no distractions here. Taking hold of the pendant that was permanently hanging around his neck, he relaxed. He had all the time in the world.
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