"Giruga eternal!" Queen Mesha of Giruga cried out her kingdom's battle cry as she stepped forward to face the grotesque monster facing them. "Sun's Prejudice!" Before her outstretched armored hands materialized a yellow disc of kal, a representation of Giruga's burning sun, from which an intense beam of light burst forth. Aham-Nishi joined in with his plasma gun, while Iltani contributed with a beam from her scepter. With all that light, heat, and plasma, the Queen and her advisors expected the monstrous intruder to be ash in an instant. They were dead wrong.

At their cue, the monster leapt off the ground at tremendous speed. Like a nimble frog the spindly beast hopped around the room, sometimes clinging to the ceiling and crawling like a spider. The Queen and her allies waved their energy projectors around like maniacs, but the creature always managed to evade their grasp, and the few times they did scorch it, it didn't seem to phase it.

Seeing that a ranged offensive wasn't going to work, the bladesmen in the room rushed forward. Wanting to assist, Mesha stepped forward again, but Aham Nishi held her back. "Hold fast, your majesty. Minister Sin-Nasir, and, if they are any competent, the Paragons shall take care of the intruder." Mesha was annoyed, but for the moment, did so.

"Culann's Harvest!" Tris stretched out his blade's image especially long to cut the rapidly moving creature down. But it only clipped the beast's hide, not even leaving a scratch. "Cedar Fall!" Sin-Nasir jumped in the monster's path and slammed his axe overhead into its chest. The heavy blade sank in, but still the monstrosity did not stop, swatting the defense-minister and his axe away with a hard swipe. In that time, Tess got behind the creature and let out a challenge of her own. "Hecatoncheires Strike!" From the girl a flurry of rapid punches, none lacking in force, battered down upon her monstrous foe. Annoyed, it turned around and sent her flying with a brutal sweep of its clawed foot. Turning around, the monster saw that many of the hapless councilors were attempting to flee. Putting on a toothy grin, it leapt towards the entrance and widely and rapidly swung its claws, tearing off chunks of meat from its crowd of prey.

Oz quickly realized that attacks without force would be useless. "Bludgeon Mode!" Originally in the it's axe-like blade form, Oz's claw morphed into a large, deadly morningstar. As the monster bore down upon the councilors, monster hunter took his turn. Winding the bludgeon up, he didn't even bother to invoke a challenge, just putting his kal into one forceful strike. The spiked head collided with its back, and to the beastman's delight, something cracked. The monster roared in pain.

Ro realized that while the monster was indeed hardy, it could still be hurt. All it needed was enough force, which she had. Or at least, she thought she did. As the monster whirled around, the fairy knight rushed forward. "Red Cross Assault!" Putting as much kal as she could into her own shield bash, Ro pushed forward. This was without a doubt the most powerful attack she had ever made. Without a doubt strong enough to pulverize a man armor and all, Ro's shield collided with the beast with the force of a small truck. She winced as the recoil of her strike shook her arm. There was a loud clanging sound. And that was it. Before she knew it, Ro was picked up by the beast and thrown across the room. The fairy was laid flat on the marble floor, gazing at the ceiling. Ro groaned. She had underestimated her strength after all.

Oz was still regaining his strength from that massive strike, so he was naturally the creature's next target. Putting all its weight in, the monster slammed into Oz's comparatively smaller form and tackled him to the ground. Pinning his arms down, the monster bared its fangs and, before the strong warrior could push him off, got ready to chomp down on the stunned beastman's skull. "Spatial Blitz!" Using his preferred space magic, Gaira shifted himself onto the back of the beast's neck. Before the monster could react, the boy raised up his knife and plunged it into its eye.

The monster screamed in agony. Gaira jumped off, and seeing the opportunity, Oz kicked the creature off. In succession, Tris jumped onto the scene and slashed his sickle-blade downwards, making a shallow cut into its shoulder. The monster clearly felt pain, but it did not bleed. Instead, what glinted below its hide was a reddish solid- ice. Tess and Sin-Nasir rushed to their side. This meant that while it might not be able to be cut or even crushed, it could be melted.

But the monster had other plans. With a mighty leap it bounded over the heads of the five warriors and rushed forward. Mesha braced herself, until she realized it wasn't going for them. At the end of the beast's path crouched two councilors, a man and a woman who had cast aside the possibility of immediate escape and hoped to ride the situation out in a corner. Frozen in fear, the two cringed as their inevitable doom bore down.

"Meteoric Iron!" Iltani cried. A few centimeters away from her scepter materialized a floating chunk of kal-infused rock, which she hurled like a bullet out of a sling. "Solar Nova!" Using his own magic Aham-Nishi fired a blast of hyperdense plasma, meant to explode with even more tremendous force.

The two projectiles collided with the monster, blasting off the hide on half of its face and the side of its chest, exposing the icy bone underneath. The creature stumbled, but it did not stop. When it reached the two hapless councilors, it set to its grisly work. In a frenzy, it grabbed the two with its claws and shoved them, clothes and all, into its elastically outstretched mouth. How two fully grown human beings could fit into the beast's stomach was incomprehensible, but it happened, and it was nourishing. As soon as the man and woman went down the monster's throat, their flesh began to be added to it's own body. It's punctured eye, it's broken bones, it's scorched face and side, all of it grew back in a split second.

That was it. Queen Mesha of Giruga could no longer stand by and watch. Shoving her sister and prime minister aside, the Mesha stepped forward and leapt. "Royal Wildform!" In less than a second the Queen was gone, and in her place was a massive tiger, claws sharpened and thirsting for blood. The big cat leapt onto the monstrous intruder, raking its titanium-hard claws down its chest and tearing off chunks and shreds of icy flesh. Where mighty weapons had failed, the Queen of Giruga was causing the beast grievous harm with primal tooth and claw. But her grotesque opponent wasn't through yet. Screeching in fury, the monster raked it's own claws down Mesha's feline form, drawing real blood, before hurling her off.

Mesha hit the ground next to her advisors and morphed back. Her armor was unscathed, and her skin was intact, but the hemorrhages her tiger-form had sustained had translated to real blood loss as a human. Her kal would regenerate it sooner or later, but for now, she was weakened. But whatever harm the Queen had been subject to, her opponent had experienced tenfold. Sin-Nasir and the Paragons rushed to her side and looked at the beast. It's abdomen had been completely clawed open, revealing the bones inside surrounding no internal organs, but rather a glowing blue orb of kal inside its ice ribcage. That must be it's weak point, the Queen and her escort knew. The source of its regeneration. Destroy it, and the rest of it would collapse. Queen Mesha and her allies readied themselves for a final charge to end the fight once and for all. And that, they realized too late, was their mistake.

The monster, even in its blood-crazed madness, knew it could not beat them all in hand to hand, for the differences in their kal were too great. Thus, it decided to even things out. Before its enemies could close the gap, the beast stretched its maw open once more. Once again the orb of red kal came into sight, and the funnel of air began yet again. The Paragons, the queen, and her advisors all cried out as the wind them. But the wind was the least of their worries. Ro found herself falling to her knees as she started to grow weaker and weaker. She knew that under her armor her skin was losing its pale pallor for a dark, burnt color. The fairy looked up and gasped as a white stream of light started to streak out of her body, just like it did from her friends, all funneling into the voracious creature's mouth. Even worse, the kal they lost was quickly being used by its thief, gradually mending and regrowing the missing ice making up its chest. No... must... keep going. But it was useless. The Challenge was the force that motivated them not only to enact great feats, but also to take on the basic tasks of living. Without it, not even the simple functions of their bodies and minds could be carried out. And that was what was happening to her. Ro started to become more and more sleepy as the life started to drain from her very being. She didn't even want to fight it anymore. As the white stream grew brighter the desire to just give up and relax became stronger and stronger.

"Gugalanna's... Vengeance." With the last of his strength Sin-Nasir muttered a challenge. The last of his waning kal was funneled into his axe, igniting it in an intense blaze and before he collapsed, the minister of defense hurled it into the beast's maw. The monster's eyes widened. The axe became lodged between it's teeth, overloading the red orb with kal. At last, the creature had no choice but to stop inhaling, lest it suffered damage from the overflow of energy. Ro and the others staggered to their feet. It had worked. The now unconscious minister of defense had saved their lives. Ro could feel her kal pool replenishing. It wouldn't be long now before she and her allies could invoke challenges again.

But would it be too late by then? The monster pulled the axe out of its teeth and bent over, wheezing. But that ended quickly, and after a few more deep breaths, it got ready to inhale once more. Ro gritted her teeth. The blue orb underneath its ribs was still visible, and if they pumped enough plasma and heat into it, they could finish it off. But her friends were still gathering their strength. Even the mighty Oz, the furious Tris, the courageous Tess, and the determined Gaira were breathing heavily, needing time to replenish their kal. She needed to do something that could give it to them. But did she have anything that she could pull off at her current power?

As it turned out, she did. Fairies didn't usually learn to fight, but there was one spell that the Fairy Queene always taught them at a young age for self defense. It was meant to be used against the few dangerous creatures that roamed the forests of Faeria, cast up front when they charged. And the best part was that since Faeries were not known for their vast reserves of kal, it could be done with very little energy. Ro had not wanted to use it in the face of the monster's claws, but now that it was getting ready to inhale again, this seemed like the perfect time. The red orb was appearing once again in the monster's mouth, but Ro wasn't going to give it a chance to use it. Dismissing her weapons and weakly throwing forth her hands, she cried out in a hoarse voice.

"Fairy Glitter!"

A silver kal orb of her own appeared between Ro's hands. From that orb sprung a torrent of silvery glitter that enveloped the monster, stopping it dead in its tracks. The partially formed orb ceased to grow, and the monster stood still as a statue. "Everyone, now!" cried the resourceful fairy. Her allies, now mostly replenished, knew what they had to do.

"Sun's Prejudice!" Queen Mesha, now in human form, produced the solar disk once more, unleashing a blast of burning sunlight.

"Solar Flare!" Aham Nishi held down the trigger of his plasma rifle, letting out an even faster volley of plasma from the already automatic weapon.

"Radiance of Itaris!" Iltani pointed her sceptre forward, producing a bright lance of yellow kal that hurtled towards the monster's wound.

Even Tess decided to throw something in. "Orb of Olympus!" An explosive sphere of orange kal appeared in her hands, which she whirled around and hurled, as an athlete in the shot-put competition on Olympus would do.

The barrage of kal, sunlight, and plasma went straight into the monster's open abdomen. Ordinarily, its terrifyingly tough hide would have been strong enough to endure it all, but its icy muscle and bone was nowhere near as resilient, especially not against its bane: heat. The beast could only stand still as the bonds keeping the ice together broke down and the ice melted into red water before evaporating into crimson steam. Before long, the icy bone protecting the monster's core was gone, and it was left at the mercy of the torrent of fire until-

Boom! The creature's body was rended from the inside out, causing it to explode in a spectacular nova of red mist. The Paragons and their allies had to raise their arms to shield themselves from the blast of heat. Finally, when the steam cleared and Ro peeked from under her arm, all that was left amongst the scraps of leathery hide and the pools of steaming red liquid was the open mawed head of the creature. The head too started to steam and sputter as it shrank and assumed a more human form. When the last of the steam evaporated away, the severed head had black hair and charred brown skin, sporting the familiar face of the nervous servant from before.

Challenges:

Sun's Prejudice: Produces an image with the form of a highly focused lens. Through this lens electromagnetic radiation can be transferred to produce a beam of heavily amplified light. (Forza Flavus, Aureus)

Cedar Fall: Dramatically increases the mass of the challenger's weapon for the purpose of producing force. (Forza Flavus)

Hecatoncheires Strike: Apportions a large amount of acceleration amongst extremely numerous strikes. (Forza Aureus)

Meteoric Iron: Generates a hunk of stone and metal that, despite the challenge's name, includes more jupiterium (a copper-kal alloy) than iron. Using a gravity-like bond of attraction between the rock and the magical focus, the challenger slingshots it at the target, upon which it explodes with tremendous force. (Forza Caeruleus, Ruber)

Solar Nova: Artificially condenses plasma into a compact, dense glob, which the gun launches at the target. Upon contact, the kal condensing the plasma dissipates, causing it to explode. (Forza Niger)

Royal Wildform: Contrary to popular myth this challenge does not actually change the challenger's shape. Before invoking, the challenger creates a series of animal-shaped images, usually in the form of an overgrown, heavily augmented version of the intended animal. These images are stored in a pocket dimension, and when the challenger wishes to take one's form, she switches places with it, entering the pocket dimension herself, from where she controls the image with her mind. (Forza Flavus, Niger)

Gugalanna's Vengeance: Causes the weapon to emit heavy amounts of kal into the surrounding atmosphere, giving the appearance of immolation. (Forza Aureus)

Fairy Glitter: Sends a torrent of hallucinogenic dust meant to overload the senses of the target opponent, immobilizing him. (Forza Caeruleus, Viridis)

Solar Flare: Rapidly speeds up the loading and firing process of the challenger's automatic weapon. (Forza Niger)

Radiance of Itaris: Produces a throwable, superheated image in the shape of a bolt of light. (Forza Flavus, Aureus)

Orb of Olympus: Produces a throwable, explosive image in the shape of a shot-put sized orb. (Forza Flavus, Aureus)