Jolthar was lying against a massive tree trunk — or what had been a tree before the corruption had spent years transforming it into something that retained the shape of wood while being something else entirely. The trunk was perhaps eight feet in diameter, blackened and twisted, but structurally solid. Solid enough to carry two people above the ground level, where the worst of the shockwaves rolled through like tide surges.
Haryntha sat beside him, close enough that her shoulder was against his. Her hands were raised slightly, not in combat posture but in the sustained positioning of someone maintaining something that required continuous attention.
Around them, barely visible but perceptible to Jolthar's enhanced senses, a barrier shimmered — clean energy against the malevolent pressure that the ten-tailed entity was broadcasting in all directions simply by existing and moving.
