They counted down, then Tom sprinted into the room. The exact actions had all been mapped out, and he knew he had to run a slight S shape to first get him close enough to monsters he was targeting with ranged attacks. Then he would sprint at the ones on the right, those that he aimed to kill at close range.

  Time slowed immediately, and he smiled. That would give him an opportunity to cast all the magic that he needed to launch. If nothing had targeted him, and time dilation hadn’t occurred, the plan would have failed, because he wouldn’t have been able to cast the spells fast enough. He would have only managed two instead of four, and the contingency plan when that happened relied on more luck than Tom had been comfortable with.

  The moment he drew near he threw a Lightning Javelin targeting the second furthest away from him, then an Extended Lightning Bolt took out the other middle placed monster. After another two steps, a precognition empowered Lightning Javelin was launched at the one closest to the real boss. By this stage, he was already starting to turn; however, the slippery surface meant it was slow, and the wide turn brought him into range so that a straight Lightning Bolt was able to strike the enemy that had originally been the nearest.

  His mind was screaming at him that he was travelling too slowly. But this was the best he could manage. A single step was all he could take before the shock wave from the first one blown up reached him; a wall of force that mostly hit from behind him. However, some of it pushed him back toward the entrance. Then the other shock waves added to the chaos.

  He was summarily tossed forward. Tom could feel the intense heat in the wave of air and he was airborne for an entire second before landing at a speed faster than he could have reached by pumping his own legs. That suited him perfectly fine, as he was on the clock. He just needed to stay on his feet for long enough to finish the other side.

  As he sprinted out of control, he concentrated on completing an Extended Lightning Bolt in one hand and a Lightning Javelin in the other.

  Carefully, he weighed the moment, holding both spells back as he hurtled toward the centre of their previous defensive line. To his annoyance, they were reacting and repositioning.

  Another step.

  In his head, he was tracking the seconds down. His count reached three, and he released his two spells at the enemies on the edge of the formation. The remaining ranged stick creatures, he knew, were preparing to fire. However, he was the one who had made a scene, and the others were at the doorway, so he should have all the monsters’ sole attention.

  This was the first test of Danger Sense in the battle, and, just when he expected it to, the skill went crazy as it warned him about incoming attacks from multiple enemies. It was not a death - it was just a request of action to avoid death; a path he was happy to follow. So, without hesitation, he threw himself flat to the ground. As he slid over the shiny marble, his new skill activated, and, for a moment, it felt like he was underneath the floor itself.

  The spell ended with a slight twist of reality, and the world was restored to normal. He leapt to his feet. The free point of fate instantly went into surviving the next three seconds, and he continued to close on the last of the ranged enemies. Using his big attack spells was not an option as he had less than five mana unspent. To kill even one of the remaining two, let alone both of them, would take more magic than he had available.

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  Time remained slow, so he could see what he was running at. Five of the small sticks were still alive, as well as two of the ranged attack versions, which were his primary target. Both of them were retreating away from him.

  Tom’s eyes narrowed.

  He had to get close enough to eliminate them before Kang started fighting, before the light statue reached him…

  Given their positioning, and given Spark’s range of only three metres, he was going to need to almost touch the smaller stick figures before he was going to be able to execute the larger ones. The explosion will take place almost next to him, which was terrifying.

  Part of him wanted to abort the attempt. He had to stay alive to finish the next floor. However, Danger Sense, while slightly more vocal than usual, was not screaming like he was about to die.

  Then the time for doubt was over. No matter what he did, he was going to end up amidst the stick figures, as his feet were going too fast and the floor was too smooth for him to slow down enough to escape at this point.

  Tom focused on the task he had set himself, which was to kill the ranged threat. The moment all the enemies were in range of Spark and no less than eleven limbs from the smaller stick figures were reaching for him, he detonated Spark, using all sixteen mana he had available.

  Two mana went into each of the stick figures, and three into the ranged opponents.

  From this close, he saw how the energy reacted to the creature’s skin. The latter had some counter-magic that tried to stop the effect, but, with Tom being in control of his magic, he was able to overwhelm the defence easily.

  After that, it was like lighting a match and throwing it into a pool of gasoline. It exploded in an inferno, and only then did Danger Sense react with a mild cautioning approach to things and an absolute command to take action. He triggered his manual skill as he tried to leap away from the blast in the hope that it would propel him through the air rather than crash him into the stone.

  Given his speed and lack of traction, it was a ridiculous attempt, but, in defiance of nature, he leapt into the air like a gazelle, reversing the direction of his momentum in an instant, and his torso somehow rotated to face the new direction of travel as well. It was trippy.

  Whoomph!

  The force of the ignition of so many stick figures close together was massive. It was as though a car had slammed into his back. The pressure was spread over him, which helped, but his brain instantly registered damage due to the whiplash that occurred not to mention the bruised internal organs from the acceleration.

  He was hurtling through the air, and his instincts made him engage Touch Heal, and, when he saw the brain injury, he was glad he had. All the serious issues were fixed in a blink… and then he found himself falling down. He positioned his feet and tried to stick the landing. He had hoped that Fateful Positioning would activate, but he wasn’t lucky enough.

  The speed he was travelling at and the height the blast had propelled him to meant he was falling way too fast to expect to walk away from the fall. All he could do was to try and minimise the extent of the damage.

  His tibia broke instantly, and then he was rolling along the hard floor like a tumbleweed until he came to a stop over forty metres from where he had started. Luckily, he had been blown towards the entrance and away from the boss.

  Tom suspected he had blacked out for a minute or two, and that he was not in a good way. That fact didn’t stop him from lifting his head and assessing the situation. Kang was fighting the giant light statue, and no other monsters were active.

  He tried to rise to his feet, but his muscles refused to cooperate.

  Instead, he slumped helplessly and waited for sufficient mana to regenerate in order to fix the damage from his bad landing; it order to be ready to take over if Kang gave out. He suspected his leg was not the only thing that was broken, because his body was not responding how it was supposed to.

  Thankfully, Kang clearly did not need aid, because, less than fifteen seconds later, the massive light statue fell apart as pieces of a shattered core rained down on the ground.

  The larger boy stood there, triumphally uninjured.

  “You okay, Tom?”

  “Yes,” he croaked out. “I’m alive and conscious, so I’ll be fine.”

  Kang walked over to him. “Great job in killing the adds. Now we only have the final floor to beat.”