He was forced to do so several more times when he and Midnight resumed their ascent. Five major bolts found them within the final meters below the crest, and from there, it was sheer carnage. The first struck before Yves had properly regained his footing. His shield erupted white in front of him, every shard lost inside the flare, coherent only for the instant required to intercept the impact before 
seized it. The pull took hold at precisely the same moment the lightning fractured across the barrier lattice. The outer shards twisted towards the crater and tore. The strain raced through the rest. The second bolt arrived instantly, before Yves had even severed the first spell. He abandoned the distorted shield and cast another— Impact — White — Rupture — Pull — Release.
By the third, there was scarcely an interval between defence and attack. dismantled every shield faster than Yves could replenish what it stripped away, no less brutally than the Witch Moon himself. He severed one conjuration after another, each collapse forcing another from him. Every new shield consumed another measure of Rothar, and every new concentration of manifested Rothar disturbed the surrounding depletion. What he created as defences became irregularities towards which the strained chains of light could crowd and rupture. More shields meant more bundled energy. More bundled energy meant more lightning. With every attempt to defend himself and Midnight, Yves incited the next attacks. Each arrived with more devastation.
By the fifth strike, Yves was no longer defending a path upwards; he was fighting the accumulation itself. had leeched the surrounding land so thoroughly that Yves and Midnight stood within it as two isolated concentrations of energy; they were manifested disorder against an environment stripped empty, and that made them targets. The principle itself was straightforward. Even if you did not knew the reason, you knew the phenomenon: rupturing chains gravitated towards greater concentrations of energy. Under ordinary conditions, that tendency determined little more than where a discharge spent itself. Here, with immense quantities of light already in motion and the whole dune around them depleted, it became catastrophic.
He was forced to do so several more times when he and Midnight resumed their ascent. Five major bolts found them within the final meters below the crest, and from there, it was sheer carnage. The first struck before Yves had properly regained his footing. His shield erupted white in front of him, every shard lost inside the flare, coherent only for the instant required to intercept the impact before seized it. The pull took hold at precisely the same moment the lightning fractured across the barrier lattice. The outer shards twisted towards the crater and tore. The strain raced through the rest. The second bolt arrived instantly, before Yves had even severed the first spell. He abandoned the distorted shield
and cast another—
Impact — White —
Rupture — Pull — Release.
By the third, there was scarcely an interval between defence and attack. dismantled every shield faster than Yves could replenish what it stripped away, no less brutally than the Witch Moon himself. He severed one conjuration after another, each collapse forcing another from him. Every new shield consumed another measure of Rothar, and every new concentration of manifested Rothar disturbed the surrounding depletion. What he created as defences became irregularities towards which the strained chains of light could crowd and rupture. More shields meant more bundled energy. More bundled energy meant more lightning. With every attempt to defend himself and Midnight, Yves incited the next attacks. Each arrived with more devastation.
By the fifth strike, Yves was no longer defending a path upwards; he was fighting the accumulation itself. had leeched the surrounding land so thoroughly that Yves and Midnight stood within it as two isolated concentrations of energy; they were manifested disorder against an environment stripped empty, and that made them targets. The principle itself was straightforward. Even if you did not knew the reason, you knew the phenomenon: rupturing chains gravitated towards greater concentrations of energy. Under ordinary conditions, that tendency determined little more than where a discharge spent itself. Here, with immense quantities of light already in motion and the whole dune around them depleted, it became catastrophic.
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