The Kaiju wasn't just bleeding. Every second his gauntlet stayed buried in the wound, the creature's stolen reserves ran out of it and into Kaiden's own pool, the points it would have spent on armies and terrain becoming his to spend instead, and the counter kept climbing. He was robbing the hoard while its owner was still lying on it.
The greatsword he condensed from the harvest came out the size of a cathedral spire, dark crimson shot through with flickering silver shapes, and he brought it down on the foreleg joint with Wrath riding the blade. The detonation buckled the limb at last.
After that, the beating found its rhythm.
Scarlet planted herself before the crown, wreathed in fire, and finally got to finish a fight.
"THIS is for the cage!" A column of red-gold fire hammered into the crack its own crash landing had split across the crown's carapace. "THIS is for deleting my last fight mid-swing!" A second column, wider than the first.
