The hold Minho had on his sword loosened. His eyes blurred and breathing was labored; the heavy weight in his limbs wouldn't subside. Still, he could not give up at this moment. Before his very eyes, the Warden had enlarged into some grotesque monstrosity that morphed of its own free will. The walls shook with the response, groaning under the weight of the Warden's power. The air seemed to bend, twisting as if the very fabric of reality was warping around them.
Minho fought against the pull, forcing his sword upward. His muscles screamed in protest, his body already broken from the battle. But he couldn't stop. He couldn't let go. Not yet.
With a guttural scream, he plunged the sword again, as hard as he could, right into the middle of the Warden's core. It grated on the bone, hacking through the heart of the monster. The Warden let out a pained yowl, and all those limbs began flailing every which way, striking wherever it might tear Minho to shreds.
The ground beneath them cracked as the Warden's arms grew longer, stretching toward Minho. A jagged claw raked across his face, peeling the skin open and sending a spray of blood back in a wide arc. Minho roared louder, his free hand coming up to grip the edge of the blade, and with one final burst of strength, he twisted it, plunging it deeper into the core.
The Warden reeled, his enormous body spasming as white-hot energy surged through the veins and fissures in its body. Its black ichor splayed in gushes across Minho's chest and legs. The world around him twisted with every pulse of the creature's dying breath. Its eye, once cold and so removed, now blazed with unholy fury. The creature wasn't fighting just for its life; it was fighting for the control of this place.
You think you can *end* me?" the Warden spat, his voice dripping with malice. "I am the Tower. I am the end of all things."
Minho's teeth ground together. "Not today.
The Warden's body buckled, folding in on itself as the core began to glow brighter, the power building within it like an eruption waiting to happen. A pulse of raw energy surged outward, sending a shockwave through the chamber that nearly knocked Minho off his feet. His body slammed against the wall again, the force of the blow rattling his bones.
Before he could think, the Warden was back on him again, talons like a cage of iron bars clamped onto his throat. Minho's vision went swimming as, unable to catch a breath of air, he tried to writhe free from its grasp. His sword was torn from his grasp in one mad scramble that sent it jingling elsewhere into the darker recesses of the room.
"*Die,*" it snarled-the eye narrowing in evident satisfaction.
Minho's mind was racing; he couldn't breathe, and his body was about to give in, but there was one thing left. One last chance.
With a desperate cry, Minho reached into his belt, pulling out a shard of obsidian-the shard he had kept hidden away for so long. His last hope. The thing that could end it all.
The Warden's grip tightened, squeezing the air out of him. He could feel his bones crushing, and yet he didn't stop. Summoning every last ounce of his remaining strength, Minho jammed the obsidian shard into the side of the Warden's head through which the twisted blade of bone surfaced from the core.
The Warden *howled*, its grasp slackening for a second.
A second was what Minho needed.
He twisted, bringing his knee up into the Warden's stomach with all the force he could muster. The creature recoiled, its clawed hand momentarily loosening from Minho's throat. And in that moment, Minho gasped for air, pulling himself free.
He didn't let one second get away from him. Minho dived to his sword and ripped it across the floor right into his palm. The Warden roared, enraged by that, in storm-like strokes of its arms, it chopped and slashed with full force to all sides deep into the walls of stone and metal of this chamber.
Minho had just barely contorted his body in time to narrowly avoid razor-sharp claws that would have torn him to shreds. The Warden was relentless: limbs everywhere, faster than Minho could follow, each and every one of them aimed at ending him. But Minho was no longer thinking. He had become *instinct*. Every movement was survival. Every strike was precision.
He sprang, flipping in the air, his sword held high above. The Warden's enormous figure was looming over him now, its numerous limbs shifting to block his blow. With a snarl of defiance, Minho *dove* his blade down through armor, pushing through layers of bone and shifting metal, into the pulsating core once more.
The impact was like nothing he'd ever felt. The room shuddered as if the very Tower itself were shaking in protest. The Warden's body contorted, a shriek of agony ripping through the air as its shape twisted and buckled. Blood and ichor splattered everywhere, drenching the floor and Minho's armor.
But still, the Warden refused to die.
You cannot win," the Warden hissed, his voice warped and strained. "The Tower is eternal. I am eternal."
Minho's breath came in ragged gasps as he stumbled backward, hardly able to stay on his feet. His body felt like stone, every movement agony. But he wasn't done. Not yet.
The Warden's body was *disintegrating*, collapsing in on itself as the core grew brighter, threatening to tear everything apart with the power inside it. The walls pulsed with an unnatural rhythm, and the very air seemed to crackle with tension. But even while the Warden's form shattered, it did not shatter enough to destroy it completely.
In one final, desperate lunge, Minho threw himself forward, the sword held high above his head. He plunged it deep into the center of the creature's glowing core; the hot surge of energy shot through the blade.
The Warden *screamed*-its voice a horrible, guttural cry that echoed through the entire chamber. And in that moment, Minho felt the world around him crack, the air shuddering as the Tower itself seemed to *fold* in on itself.
For a moment, there was nothing but *darkness*.
Minho's sword was deep inside the Warden's core. His body went numb, and his mind just barely held on to consciousness. Then, in one final *explosion* of energy, the Warden's body finally disintegrated completely.
There was silence.
Minho dropped to his knees, bleeding from his wounds, exhaustion overwhelming him. The room around him was quiet-*dead*. The twisted walls that had once pulsed to life now lay silent, their pulsing veins reduced to nothing but empty, decaying husks.
Minho's head spun. His chest heaved as he struggled to stay upright. He did it. He had *won*. But at what cost?
He looked upon the destroyed chamber, the broken pieces of the Warden's body strewn across the floor, and felt absolutely nothing.
The fight was over, but the war was far from over.