Vareth's bloodied hand rose from the wreckage. His voice, gurgling and wet, screamed a single word.
The ground split open.
A golem erupted from beneath the street, but this one was different. Massive. Eight meters tall, its body made of compressed stone and reinforced metal from the surrounding infrastructure. It raised a fist towards the fox.
The fox didn't dodge.
It raised both paws and caught the fist.
Starlight energy exploded from the fox's body, blindingly bright, casting sharp shadows in every direction. The energy traveled down the golem's arm like a disease, cracking stone, melting metal, unraveling the mana structure that held the construct together.
The golem's fist shattered into a thousand fragments.
The fox's body expanded. Its three-meter frame grew, stretched, swelled until it matched the giant golem in size. Starlight fur became a cascade of cosmic energy. Nine tails split into streams of concentrated power.
