Crap, I need my feet to hold her, turning around to see the forest. That's it! He pulled the shadows from the trees, shaping them into fists with his fingers, hurtling them into the snake's mouth.

His hands flowed like water, guiding the dark fists to obstruct every serpent's attack on his life. Both professor and student weaved their hands like snakes, countering each other's hits with unparalleled speed until she crushed her hands, bringing them together for a grand takedown.

Now! He clenched his good fist, fighting the cracking of his hands to hold them all at bay. Sehki watched her face drop when he launched the other fist, finger running it underneath her snakes to smash a flame punch to her face.

She got black back towards a tree, blossoming up with rage. "How did you get so strong?"

He wiped his smile. "A strong man always uses their fingers to impress women," emulating Madam's training to just go for the kill.

While rushing into close quarters resulted in him swerving from acid venom that managed to hinder his shadow, Ainsley's attempts to free the petrified souls only amounted to about a dozen as Candy finished patching Bethany's wounds.

"This is taking too long. At this rate, he'll be finished and I'll be out of magic!"

"But if you two fight her while the others are at risk, they may never return."

Candy shyly raised her hand. "Getting frozen into stone is the magic wearing the user to lock them in place, right?"

"It's dependent on how much the user can focus their control."

"So it's like wearing clothing with a lock? Then instead, Ainsley, submerge everyone into the ground!"

The nurse and heir turned to her, confused. She gasped.

"Oh um, I mean if we submerge them, Lord Ainsley could siphon parts off everyone's head to use in place while the rest of their bodies stay intact and safe. Just make a hole so everyone has enough air to breathe!"

They looked to Bethany. "Can it work?"

"It would take less time. Prince Sehki, can you distract her for a little longer?"

"No! But since you asked so nicely," forcing his depleted shadow to shield the vulnerable students from Gorgon's venom, "I'll give you three minutes before the Demon King gets upset!"

"That's more than enough!" Bethany transformed into her centaur form, raising her limbs high into the sky and slammed into the ground, quaking and shifting the land mass upwards.

Ainsley channeled their power into the ground, dragging the statues down into the dirt and opening up small holes. Sehki rose up the higher platforms, holding up her hair with his shadow.

Thinking close combat would be easy got him on the defense, weaving from her fists and pushing her kicks aside. He slashed his nails across the fist she threw, unable to block her knee to his stomach, prey to body dropping smack.

He narrowly avoided her heel drop only for her snakes to bite his shadow. They couldn't turn it solid, but she twirled his body hard enough to throw him airborne, creating the giant snake.

"This time you won't escape death!"

Sehki prepared for the worse when the air in the field burst open. The snake and Gorgon were blown back as a giant dragon-esque creature of dirt skin kicked the serpent's head away, while Candy and Bethany grabbed Sehki.

He opened his mouth with glee.

"We're on a Qilin!"

Bethany's legs were attached, piloting their movements while Ainsley's hands kept it steady from the fanged chomp, throwing it towards the dorm, but backhanding the serpent from reaching it.

Vexxed, she had her pet massive blasts of venom that polluted the sky, eventually struck down the wings. The earth heir kept their wits while Sehki was sweating, worried about the people below.

"You have a plan right?"

"You believe in me, right?"

He nodded as Ainsley told him the plan, but wanted to make one small adjustment they agreed on as Gorgon made their move. Sehki added his arm to boost Ainsley's control, commanding the golem chimera to pounce at them.

Gorgon smiled, using the great serpent tail's to bounce off into the sky and avoid their attacks entirely.

"I'll use all of my magic," charging up and releasing a stream of acid venom wide enough to cover the entire field, "and evaporate you all!"

"Now!"

Bethany swallowed a pill, adjusting her glasses as she began spinning around. The chimera dragon did the same as the drug limited the effects of vertigo while Ainsley had the dragon's tail smack the ground and lift itself airborne as it spun.

The vortex in the air compiled the range of the acid directly in the middle where the only targets would be themselves. Against certain doom, Bethany detached herself, grabbing Ainsley, who dropped them underneath the shell, covering their surface seconds as the venom began dissolving the creature.

"Turning your own artwork into your own tomb," laughing. "How pathetically fitting!"

Ainsley smiled as Qilin's mouth opened up, launching an ice boulder the size of a dorm room, with Candy and Sehki inside, wrapped with his shadow.

"Seems you forgot Cassiopeia didn't win that battle alone!"

The acid rain quickly began dissolving it but Gorgon's face realized too late that was their goal once the boulder only melted enough for the two fae to slip out.

Candy froze their escape route first and held onto the Demon King's clothing. Sehki added the shadow emitting from the chimera to his own. It enfolded the boulder to his control, now above her and her massive serpent.

"Embrace Nature's Darkness," swinging it down with Candy's assistance. "Gaia's Icefall!"

The young prince and fashion artist slammed it into her face and snake back down to the ground, but the dissolving chimera rock formation pieces reforged into a sphere trapping all of Gorgon but her head.

Ainsley manipulated the rest into dirt, slowly resting it on the ground while giving their deceptive professor a safe descent. Bethany raced up what they did not remove, jumping off the platforms to save the fifth heir and his new friend:

One of them denied screaming even as she returned him to stand on the field.

A well earned victory.