About a dozen of the creatures began moving in and maltreated the fragile balance of damaging and tanking between the two fighting beings, between the dwarf and the giant that towered over anyone else on this field, but the dwarf was not done with their fight, no, Cades began shooting out overload after overload, desperate to finally have a rest that didn't consist of him hanging 300 foot in the air, dangling on and all of that only for about a few minutes.
The overloads danced along the in-conductive surface of the wood, something that had previously been different but had seemingly changed with these new opponents, perhaps because their biology in life might have been in-conductive to electricity, but either way, the magical lightning was different as it was slowly forcing its ways into them, attracted to the mana inside them, desperate to burn it, it was actually quite beautiful, watching the violent purple streaks of lightning dance across the now burning bodies of the pig-like bipedal monsters that had previously annoyed Cade so, so much.
But the actives were quickly exhausting him, a fact made even worse by the fact that the mage had now began nearing this location as well, the weird apparitions already appearing in the air and some of the unmoving puppets already starting to move in a weirdly trance-like pattern that seemed to perfectly emulate the way the magical apparitions were designed, or rather created to shoot at, Cades and the few puppets that were keeping him busy while the two master-puppets, the hunter and the hunchback healed themselves, with the hunchback already almost being done with the process and starting to join the now quite repetitive battle once more.
And all of that after just about half a minute, now the hunchback was back in the clash, the two fighters on our side exhausted, Cades felt as if the was burning everywhere and he had an unimaginable headache, feeling as if he was forgetting something, his magic was still being blocked, and now the hunchback was back, he might've exhausted his magic though.
As such he was simply grabbing the bigger puppets and throwing them at the already known slower speed, but the accuracy was almost insane, especially when one added on top that the projectiles themselves later stood up and joined the fight with the already tired Cades who had now, after destroying most of the pig puppets and having to wait just a second gained enough time to try something, something that he was desperate for right now, with his body covered in gashes from the hunter, his feet sore from the hunchback, his skin burning because of his own lightning and the mage almost arriving and soon being close enough to fight them once more.
Cades had been aching to try this active ever since he gained it, that might've only been a few minutes ago, though it did indeed feel as an eternity, but he could feel the desperate need, and soon after he called for the unknown energy, and it gushed through the gates of his mana arteries that were still being guarded by what one could only really calla s policemen of mana.
The foreign energy rushed through his body while he was still fighting, though this made it quite a bit more difficult, but it was also relieving, it relaxed him, and at that it relaxed him so much that he made a small mistake and gained another cut that was now healing at a much greater speed than even a trolls, a speed that one could easily observe with the naked eye, a speed that he had reached once before, a speed that he had thought to be impossible in this place where all kinds of regeneration and even aging itself seemed to be blocked.
Perhaps it was because the regeneration springing from the active engrained in his bones, his very mana itself, was overcharged, overloaded, but the regeneration even managed to heal him in his current horrible situation, and soon after Cades was completely back to his old power, no exhaustion to be felt, although that might've been a kind of illusion instead of an actual bonus to this active after all, seeing that his muscles were still trembling but Cades couldn't feel much pain and refusal from them as he had felt previously when he was still fighting without having been healed.
And not a second to early seeing as the entire sky above their heads, the very same endless green that had previously been disturbed only when Cades fell through the thick ceiling of leaves began to burn, illuminating a weird orange pentagram that called out to them, as if it wanted them to touch it, but rather than having to touch it the Pentagram soon after began to turn quickly and just a few seconds later the mage appeared and the pentagram disappeared, as if their positions were swapped, as if one was the other and the drawing was the flying circle that the mage was stuck on all this time, now she was here, her feet still stuck to the ceiling o which the incredibly complicated circle was drawn, her body bent in a weird way to look at them, causing her hair to fall down into the ground.
Cades could feel just how many tricks she had prepared, but at the same time he could hear an exclamation, a calm command, if one would call it as such, that resounded deep within his mind, in a voice that he had come to know just a few days ago, a voice that he couldn't believe of what it was saying now.
"Stay still and continue fighting, Cades, I will take care of the mage. Right now me and her are the most compatible, both of us are physically not exactly much of a powerhouse, but both of us are masters of skills, she has her countless diagrams, I have my actives, leave her to me, I might not be able to win, but I should be able to hold her back for long enough for you to defeat the puppets here."
The voice of the archer was still incredibly calm, but right now it had been quicker than Cades had ever thought possible, it was more like the intent, as if he could read it and hear it, as if he himself thought it up in an instance and already knew what it was, but he would heed the command, he would heed the plan of the only one that had made a plan and continue to fight the puppets surrounding him.
He could only pray that Manug might survive.