But the math was unforgiving. Six percent mana against four thousand tendrils meant roughly ninety seconds of sustained Reaper's Edge output before I collapsed from mana exhaustion.
Blair's reserves were higher but finite. The tendrils kept coming, growing from the floor faster than the two of us could destroy them, the core pumping mana into its final defense with the desperate urgency of an organism fighting for survival.
"We can't clear them all," Blair said through gritted teeth. A tendril snaked past her fire and caught her left arm.
She tore free with a scream of pain and fury that echoed off the cavern ceiling, leaving behind skin and blood on the barb.
Her flames flared brighter, fueled by rage, and a twenty-foot section of tendrils vaporized in a flash hot enough that I felt my eyebrows singe from five feet away.
