Pruthvi tapped his feet and the walls crashed down to the ground.

Almourah's territory was torn into a battlefield, the horde of beasts against the five youngsters representing the entire nation. Time demanded complete concentration on my stone, nevertheless, it was essential to keep an eye on four of them. My teacher had asked me to be their back up. They ran savagely towards the battalion of them and in four different directions with the speed of the beam. Flamed spirals discharged out of my palms and extended like a spring with the increasing distance.

Celina thrust a slew of piercing currents of wind. She aimed for the torso of the beasts and slashed one after the other. A predominant amount of colorless sticky mass of liquid squirted all over the snowy surface around her feet. Few of them escaped from her sharps windy spikes. She forced them to get derailed and had them trapped in the bitter cyclone. Yowling, beasts levitated off the ground.

Pruthvi acted immediately. Crumbling rocks knocked them down, colliding with one another having beasts smashed between them. Sickly innards and leaking white gore greased the surface. The nauseating smell wafted in the air.

Hardik swished and whirled aimlessly.

It was an intention to transmit the extra amount of fire with intensified heat as support for Leena. Snow around her melted. She doubled the volume of water, changing its shape into inverted icicles. Hurling them around, the icicles punctured the beasts' hearts and slit their necks.

She directed the water towards Tyrell. Electricity passed through the water, in the direction he desired. It took away the lives of only the beast, didn't even give a minor shock to Leena. She was simply playing her way around with the same stream of water. He was quick at killing. No scream came from the place he had taken the charge, unlike from the sides overtaken by the rest. An innumerable number of the beasts, all at once, descended down to the ground beside him, unmoving. Tyrell was in a slayer mode, settling his scores for all the pain and suffering.

Dead bodies. Everywhere. The horrid stench. The snow shimmering with acid. The attenuated shine of the lightning from the sky booming with waves of thunder. I stood at the same spot passing on the support my friends needed to do all the work. The incoming of the sea of beasts kept rolling in. I realized Tyrell and Leena, being totally focussed and immersed at slaughtering, were moving ahead whereas Pruthvi and Celina stepped back. I couldn't afford to lessen my flowing fire, nor I could falter my concentration. I moved with them, passing on the equal amount of fire the five of us needed.

They were caught up in their acts and none of them saw a group of beasts running from between both the parties, directed at me and not sure why. I creased my brow, my hands were tied up with the fire spilling out. They were fast approaching and I had to reform the idea.

I let go of the spiral, took one step ahead and generated innumerable powerful balls of fire. They changed their forms into fists and punched them in their guts in a sequential manner. The snow dramatically melted like a glacier, and then it struck me that it might get difficult to stay put and reach out to the beasts.

Pruthvi and Leena came together, quick ideas seemed to be dancing in their minds. They forged a partnership. A shout escaped Pruthvi's throat when he attempted to raise a part of the ground upward, lifting the five of us slightly up. Leena cleared the way, she flicked her hand and the melting water gushed away into the stream in the forms of waves.

"What the hell!" Pruthvi suddenly shouted. Startled, I followed his sight. Hardik flew inside the lighthouse. It was back to being nervous about the commotion getting violent. A heavy group of the beasts was on the verge to chase it down jumping from one over the other.

"Go!" Celina yelled, slashing the long hand of one of the beasts, "You can't lose his body to them."

"Leave!" Pruthvi yelled, running across me to stand in the middle of Leena and Celina, "We'll take care of everything here. Just go."

From the corner of my eye, I noticed Tyrell already running towards the lighthouse, blue electricity circled like chains around his fists. I believed in the three of them to deal with the beasts while Tyrell and I left, but I couldn't leave them alone in this torturous weather. I came up with an instant idea. The dead beasts were sprawled around and now I could use them well. Fire explosion was enough to burn the bodies away. It spread from one carcass to another like wildfire. Although the melting snow could have stopped my fire from spreading, the cyclone that Celina created doubled the intensity. The rampage was obvious. The ground of territory gradually turned into a graveyard with millions of pyres putting the corpses to peace.

The sky thundered.

I wheeled around and dashed towards the lighthouse. The beasts were climbing up the wall easily and jumped inside through the window. Tyrell was already inside. Sparks were penetrating out of the door. As I entered the first thing I noticed was Hardik flying high across the ceiling amidst the gibbets. It, not being used to Tyrell's voice, wasn't obeying to his orders at all. He and I nodded at each other and began burning and electrocuting the beasts at the same time. A great number of beasts rushed in. We were forced to step over the staircase while putting them instant death. Within moments we reached the chamber, where a few beasts had already entered. Hardik was behind our backs, flying low.

Tyrell killed every beast in the chamber and then took a break. He bent down holding his knees, panting. Another beast ran towards him, and before it can even touch him, I burned it down.

"Thanks!" he said, sniggering.

"Watch out for yourself," I said, trying to pull his leg, "Can't keep saving your sorry unmentionables all the time."

A couple of beasts charged towards Hardik, snorting and snuffling. Tyrell immediately shocked them with electricity to dead. "Oh, you so would," he said, confidently. "Saving your friends comes naturally to you. It's your life's mechanism, or should I say Mackay-nism?"

We laughed and slaughtered, both at the same time as if playing the third version of Fallout on Pruthvi's computer. We wanted to get away from this dreaded place where I had died countless times. Never had I wanted to return here and have another fight but the incoming beasts were stubbornly blocking our way out.

"So," he said, slamming the head of the beast to the wall. "Found your dream girl yet?"

My stomach knotted with a sudden twinge of nostalgia, flames came out small and benign as if from a lighter. I slapped the beast hard making it fall on the other alighted beast. "For the last freaking time, there's no one." And when he raised a single eyebrow watching the lingering smile on my face, I blurted out. "It's Pruthvi's sister."

It was now his turn to be shocked rather than the beast. He gaped at me like a fish.

I made a face. "Yeah, I broke the code. Sue me now!"

"Nuh-uh," he said, shoving a couple of beast to the wall stained with my dried blood. They got ruptured, creating a cracking sound of eggs and acid spilled down in streaks. "Worse. You need to run away from the country."

"Huh! Why?"

"I'm going to tell everybody, put up flyers everywhere that you are going to nail your best friend's sister."

Heat rose to my cheeks-figuratively and literally. Fire spouted out from my hands and had I not steadied myself, I could have fried Hardik up. She was in my mind since the battle had begun, smiling persistently at me. Suddenly, with his remark, I felt embarrassed to look at her anymore. "Shut it, you wouldn't!"

He laughed like a hyena.

"Hey, you are thinking too far," I said, "It's not official, we haven't even kissed yet."

He grimaced, holding the neck of the beast, and squeezing it grudgingly. "Weren't you two alone in the Parallel Universe for an entire month?"

"Yeah. So?"

"Such a beautiful opportunity. What the heck were you doing? Playing duck, duck, goose?" The beast in his hand convulsed before he threw it down on the floor.

"She is neither Celina nor Leena in this matter," I said, exploding a few beasts in a row, "Things have to be really slow with her. If I do anything inappropriate she'll ditch me, dump me even before we start dating."

"Oh, sensitive type?" he said, "So much like me and Celina."

"What did I just tell you. She is NOT Celina."

"Oh no, I was comparing Nazira Khan with me."

He was lucky that Celina wasn't here listening to his remark.

The laughter and slaughtering went on until the rate of the incoming beast reduced. I instructed Hardik quite seriously to stay right behind us and never to disappear. We quickly dashed off the chamber keeping an eye on it.

The night had fallen. There was dampness in the air mixed with the odor that smelled a zillion times worse than the rotting rats.

"By the way," Tyrell said, as we headed quickly down the staircase, "I know he is one of your living relatives but isn't it too weird that you and Shashi have similar tastes?"

"What do you mean?"

"You both have your eyes on the throne and Nazira Khan?"

I stopped and looked back up at him with mild curiosity. "Do you know why he is taking an interest in her?"

"No," he said, quite sincerely. "Apparently the rumors are still going strong that she has powers that match Zarina Khan's. It's just a rumor, right?"

Match Zarina's? Now that was the joke of the day and I wanted to laugh and cry all at once.

"Yes," I said, turning around and hiding my face from him, "Just a rumor."

In the ensuing darkness, the moment we reached halfway down, a squelching sound through the wet thick muddy thread of the stairs alerted me. I frowned and lit my hands. A sharp gasp escaped my throat.

"Geez!" Tyrell muttered.

The lower part of the lighthouse was completely covered with water, the bodies were floating face down. It was beyond the bounds of possibility that the pyres I had created could have melted the entire territory's hard perennial snow. My jeans began to soak up. Water was quickly filling inside the lighthouse. Neither Tyrell nor I could use our Formations in this situation. The main question was from where did so much water showed up. What the heck were my friends doing?

"Leena! Celina!" I shouted, trying to connect with them for their help.

"Or Vrindahina!" Tyrell cried, "Just anyone!"

Hardik flew hurriedly above us. Its sudden swiftness gave me goosebumps. There was a moment of silence when Tyrell and I stepped back up on the steps giving in to our instincts. A creak followed an eerie rattle as if something was thrashing against the wall of the lighthouse. We glanced at each other, similar thoughts crossing our minds. The very next moment one of the walls blasted with tremendous boom shaking the giant of the lighthouse. A huge wave flooded inside tearing down everything standing in its way. The gibbets broke loose from its hinges and smashed down against the water. The staircase began to splinter into pieces. Tyrell grunted slipping in the outburst of the freezing water. I held his hand and pulled him up forcibly making him get hold of the railing. We were drenched and muddy, both of us trapped in the partly wrecked lighthouse, and there seemed to be no way out.

Then I noticed something floating in the water, a weapon like- thin at the handle and spherical at the top. Before I could make out what it really was, Leena's voice rang in my head. "Hayden, I'm coming for you."

"Fine! Make it quick!" I said with a shivering tone.

"Who was that?" Tyrell asked, resisting hard from getting knocked down by the flowing water.

"Leena," I replied, feeling a prickle in my arm muscle, "She's coming. Just hang in there."

"As if I have a choice!" he grumbled.

The rush of the water suddenly quickened its pace, the whipping waves making me incompetent to swim. My muscles started to tremble. I gasped for breath, everything from neck below was completely swamped inside the water, and the sensation of drowning took me over. Tyrell coughed and suddenly shifted his position. Slowly, the strain in my muscles reduced and I realized the water was magically getting bisected, providing us a way to escape from it. I let out a huge sigh of relief when my feet touched the thread of the staircase.

"Hurry!" Leena had entered the lighthouse and stood within hailing distance.

Tyrell and I scurried down. His breath was ragged and I was shivering so violently that my teeth chattered together.

"What the hell was that?" Tyrell wheezed, setting his wet hair straight.

"The entire Uttarameer is here," she said, having her hand slightly up to put the pressure against the water. "Clan of Matsyasvi and Pizaca joined us up in the war."