Lightning exploded across the clearing.
A blue streak hit Taro from the side — not an attack, a body — and both of them hit the ground several meters away as the troll's arm came down and shattered the earth where Taro had been standing. The impact sent a shockwave through the clearing that knocked two nearby students off their feet.
Taro blinked. Looked at the crater where he'd been standing. Then looked at Lysander beside him, lightning sparks still fading from his boots.
"...You're fast."
"Get up," Lysander said.
They were already moving. The troll had turned toward them — the new threat registering — and Bran immediately stepped back into its sightline, slamming his shield against his arm to draw the attention back. The troll hesitated between targets. One second. Enough.
Lysander pulled Taro behind a fallen tree. "I need to reach the back of its neck. Behind the ear — the armor is thin there. One clean strike and the regeneration stops."
Taro looked at the troll. Twenty feet tall, currently being harassed by Bran and two others who were doing their best to keep it occupied. Then back at Lysander.
"You need to get to its shoulder."
"Yes."
"And you need me to launch you."
"Yes."
Taro grinned. It was the slightly unhinged grin of someone who had found the shape of a problem they could actually solve. "Okay. I can do that." He cracked his knuckles. "Give me a signal."
Across the clearing, Lyra had climbed into a tree and was firing arrows at the troll's face — not trying to pierce it, just trying to keep its attention moving. The troll swung at the tree. She jumped to the next one. The rhythm of it was keeping the monster turning, preventing it from focusing on any one target long enough to do real damage.
But it wasn't enough to end the fight. Nothing they had was enough to end the fight. They were managing — coordinating well for a group of first-years in a situation none of them had trained for — but managing wasn't killing and the troll wasn't tiring.
Lysander watched it move. The pattern was still there — the shoulder drop before a committed strike, the quarter second where its guard opened slightly. He'd counted it four times now. It was consistent.
"Bran," he said, loud enough to carry. "When it swings at you — let it push you back. Create distance. Draw it toward the center."
Bran didn't ask why. He just nodded.
The troll swung. Bran gave ground — dramatically, stumbling back, making it look worse than it was. The troll followed, moving toward the center of the clearing the way predators followed retreating prey.
Its back was to Lysander and Taro.
Taro dropped into a crouch, hands forming a platform. "Now?"
Lysander stepped onto it.
"Now."
Wind burst upward. He left the ground fast — faster than he'd expected, the force of it carrying him in a clean arc toward the troll's back. The monster was already starting to turn, some instinct registering the new threat from above.
He landed on its shoulder.
The surface was like stone — dense and rough, the skin hardened into natural armor everywhere except the specific points where joints required movement. He found his footing in half a second and ran. The troll's hand came up immediately, enormous and fast.
He was faster.
The weak point. Behind the ear, where the neck met the skull, a gap in the armor no wider than his hand. Three steps. Two. The troll's hand came crashing down toward its own shoulder.
One chance.
He drew.
The blade found the gap. Quick draw, precise, all the speed and timing the technique was built for — Mode 2, his strongest clean strike, everything placed exactly right.
Click.
He jumped clear as the troll's hand smashed into its own shoulder. The impact threw him sideways and he hit the ground hard, rolled, came up with his ears ringing and his shoulder aching.
The troll stumbled.
It didn't fall. But it stumbled — something had changed, some system interrupted, the fluid confidence of its movement suddenly uncertain. It swung at nothing. Stepped in a wrong direction. Its regeneration was still active but slower, the wound at the neck not closing at the rate everything else had been closing.
Lysander looked at it from the ground.
Not dead. But hurt in a way it hadn't been before.
He got up.
"Again," he said. "Same point. Everyone — keep it occupied."