And the hog was waiting for them.
It stood in the center of the clearing, looking as though a jagged boulder from the mountain had sprouted legs and learned how to breathe. Arata stopped dead.
The creature was absolutely enormous, its heavily muscled shoulders rising higher than a man's chest. Thick, gray-black hide covered its body, layered with overlapping ridges of hardened, calcified tissue. Two massive, chipped tusks curved violently upward from its jaw.
But it was the horns that demanded Arata's attention. A pair of heavy, heavily ridged horns rose from the crown of the beast's head, glowing with thin, pulsing veins of pale, volatile energy.
The hog lowered its massive head, scraping a hoof against the stone. The ground physically shook.
Ren tightened his grip on the haft of his hammer. "That is significantly bigger than I expected."
Daichi raised his carbine to his shoulder. "Don't underestimate it."
Mina drew her sidearm, moving swiftly toward a rear support position. "Everyone spread out! Give it no single target!"
The hog charged.
The damp earth erupted beneath its driving hooves, throwing chunks of soil into the air. It moved with terrifying speed for its size. Arata threw himself sideways, diving into a roll as the creature passed within mere inches of him. Its massive tusk tore straight through the trunk of a petrified tree behind him, snapping the thick wood with a deafening crack.
Arata landed hard, scrambling to his feet. Ren charged in from the opposite flank. "Now!"
He swung the hammer with everything he had. The hog twisted with surprising agility, catching the blow on one of its glowing horns.
The impact produced a deafening, metallic thunderclap.
Then, violet energy exploded outward.
Ren's eyes widened in sheer panic. "Uh—"
Lightning discharged in a blinding flash. The raw electrical force traveled violently down the creature's horn, coursing through its massive body before exploding directly into the ground beneath it. The earth around the hog flashed white, and the sheer concussive shockwave threw Ren entirely backward off his feet. He hit the dirt hard, tumbling head over heels.
"REN!" Arata shouted.
"I'm fine!" Ren yelled back, coughing on dust.
The hog screamed, enraged but uninjured. Arata stared in horror. The horn had acted as a lightning rod, safely grounding the electrical discharge.
"Don't hit the horns directly!" Daichi roared over the ringing in their ears.
Ren dragged himself upright, shaking his head to clear it. "That would have been extremely useful information five seconds ago!"
The hog wheeled around and charged again, locking its furious eyes on Sera.
Sera threw her arm forward. Blue light exploded from the bracelet, instantly forming a complex, glowing circular formation in the air. Water gathered in a dense, swirling mass, hardening into a thick, hydrostatic barrier.
The hog smashed through the first barrier like it was made of glass.
Sera's eyes widened in terror. She funneled more mana, forming a second barrier. The beast shattered it without slowing down. She scrambled backward, her boots slipping on the wet loam. "Arata!"
"I've got it!" Arata sprinted forward, intercepting the charge. The dark sword in his hands felt utterly alive, thrumming with contained power. The red crystals burned with brilliant intensity. He slashed horizontally across the creature's massive flank. The blade bit deep, shearing through the hardened, calcified hide.
The hog roared in agony, whipping its head around. Arata spun away just in time as a jagged tusk ripped through the air exactly where his torso had been a millisecond before.
Ren came rushing in from the beast's blind spot, bringing the hammer around in a low, devastating sweep. The iron head struck the creature's hind leg with a sickening crunch. The hog stumbled, its balance faltering.
Ren grinned fiercely. "That worked! Again!"
He wound up for a second strike, but the hog recovered faster than its bulk suggested. Its massive head snapped around, and the blunt side of its glowing horn caught Ren squarely in the chest. He flew backward like a ragdoll.
Mina broke from cover, sprinting forward. "Ren!"
Daichi grabbed her harness, hauling her back. "Wait! It's still tracking!"
Ren rolled painfully across the uneven ground and slammed hard into the base of a tree, lying terrifyingly still. For one agonizing second, Arata thought he was dead.
Then, a low groan echoed from the roots. "That..." Ren slowly pushed himself upright, clutching his ribs. "...really hurt."
Arata exhaled a sharp breath of relief. "Can you move?"
"Yes."
"Then move!"
The hog charged again, tearing the earth apart. Ren threw himself desperately sideways as the creature's tusks ripped a massive gouge out of the tree trunk right where his head had been.
Sera fired from the perimeter. Four shimmering water spheres materialized around her wrist, snapping instantly into high-velocity spears. The projectiles streaked through the air, burying themselves deep into the creature's thick shoulders. The hog staggered, its momentum broken.
Arata saw the opening. He didn't just swing the blade; he reached deeper into the sword's core, pulling on the strange, waiting resonance. The red crystals responded violently. A torrent of searing heat spread from his palm straight up to his shoulder, making the heavy iron feel completely weightless.
He stepped directly into the beast's path. The hog tried to pivot, lowering its head to gore him. Arata cut upward, driving the blade directly into the damaged horn.
Red energy exploded across the dark steel. The horn fractured with a sound like a rifle shot. The hog screamed, rearing back. Arata pushed harder, forcing the mana out. Flame erupted along the entire length of the sword. It wasn't ordinary fire; it was a violent, superheated orange-red torrent that roared like a jet engine, wrapping around the blade in a vortex.
Arata gritted his teeth against the sheer heat. "Get away!"
Ren understood immediately. He grabbed Sera by the back of her vest and hauled her backward behind a rocky outcropping.
Arata drove forward, putting his entire body weight behind the flame-wreathed blade. He struck the fractured horn. The structure shattered completely, spraying pale, dying energy into the air.
The creature unleashed a deafening, agonizing scream. A massive surge of uncontrolled energy exploded outward from its ruined skull. The shockwave threw Arata violently backward, slamming him hard into the unyielding earth. The sword slipped from his numb fingers, clattering away into the dirt.
For several agonizing seconds, Arata couldn't draw breath. The wind had been knocked completely out of his lungs.
Then he heard Sera's terrified voice. "Arata!"
He forced himself up onto his knees, coughing violently. The hog was still standing. Its breathing was wet and ragged, blood and dark fluid pouring freely from its horrific wounds. But it was not finished. It lowered its massive head, fixing its bloodshot eyes on him. The remaining, unbroken horn began to glow with blinding, erratic energy.
Ren stepped up beside Arata, raising his crackling hammer. "One more."
Arata dragged himself to his feet and snatched his sword from the dirt. Sera stepped forward on his other side, her armlet blazing with an almost blinding blue aura.
The hog charged, tearing up the final stretch of ground between them.
Daichi shouted from the tree line. "Now!
Ren struck first. He met the charge head-on, bringing the hammer crashing down into the creature's leading shoulder. Violet lightning exploded outward in a blinding web, staggering the beast and arresting its momentum.
Arata followed a fraction of a second later. He drove his sword straight down, burying the blade deep into the earth beneath the creature's hooves. A geyser of roaring red flame erupted upward from the soil, locking the creature's legs in a cage of fire. It thrashed, unable to advance.
Arata looked at Sera. "Now!"
Sera threw both hands forward, pouring every ounce of accumulated mana through the silver armlet. The blue aura expanded wildly. One massive sphere of water materialized. Then another. Then a third. Then a fourth. They grew larger and larger, rising into the air to surround the trapped hog—one above, one below, two flanking its sides.
Sera's eyes went wide, her arms trembling under the immense arcane pressure. "I can't hold this!"
"Just do it!" Arata roared.
Sera screamed, throwing her hands together. The four enormous spheres collapsed inward, compressing with terrifying density into massive, spear-like forms aimed directly at the beast's center of mass.
The creature roared its defiance.
Arata ripped his sword from the earth, unleashing a horizontal tornado of fire that screamed across the clearing. At the exact same millisecond, Sera released the four hyper-compressed water spears, striking the beast from four opposing vectors.
The hog disappeared entirely inside the catastrophic collision of elements.
Flame roared, water instantly vaporized into superheated steam, and the resulting explosion shook the very foundations of the cavern. Massive trees bent backward, their leaves stripped bare by the shockwave.
Ren planted his boots, throwing his arms up to shield his face from the blast. Daichi grabbed Mina by her harness, dragging her violently behind a thick, fallen trunk as debris rained down around them.
For several long, deafening seconds, there was nothing but fire, steam, and blinding dust.
Then, absolute silence.
The dust slowly settled over the ravaged clearing. The hog lay completely motionless in a smoking crater. Its enormous body began to break down, dissolving rapidly into a fine, gray ash that drifted across the scorched earth.
And from that ash rose a massive, overwhelming torrent of raw mana.
Arata stared, catching his breath. There was more energy radiating from the corpse than he had ever seen. Thick, brilliant blue-white threads rose like a geyser. The red crystals in his sword flared to life, burning like coals. The violet stones in Ren's hammer erupted with blinding static. Sera's sapphire crystals turned almost pure white. The ambient mana flowed into the ancient weapons like water into a drain, charging all three relics simultaneously to their absolute limits.
Ren stared at his brilliantly glowing hammer, chest heaving. "That..." He looked over at Arata, his face smeared with dirt and soot. "...was entirely worth it."
Arata let out a weak, breathless laugh, leaning heavily on his sword.
Sera dropped to one knee in the dirt, clutching her wrist. "I am never, ever doing that again."
Ren smiled tiredly. "You said that yesterday."
"I absolutely meant it this time."
Daichi approached the crater cautiously, his analog scanner clicking so fast it sounded like a continuous scream. "Everyone stay perfectly still."
Arata looked at the violently twitching needle. "What's happening?"
"The mana release is enormous. It's off the charts."
Hayama's voice suddenly cracked through their earpieces, sharp and urgent.
"Daichi."
"Yes?"
"What is the reading?"
Daichi stared at the wildly fluctuating numbers. "Still rising. It hasn't peaked."
Hayama was silent for two seconds. Then: "Get away from the corpse. Now."
They didn't hesitate. They scrambled backward, putting distance between themselves and the crater. The last remnants of the hog completely dissolved into the air, the final surges of mana vanishing into their weapons. For several seconds, the three teenagers stood in the dim cavern, glowing like beacons. Arata's sword burned red, Ren's hammer crackled with violet arcs, and Sera's armlet radiated a piercing blue.
Then, something behind them moved.