Fire B2C13

Instead, I threw my weight against the huge stack of wood and pushed with all my might. It creaked and shifted, but didn't fall. I howled and put everything I had into it. It had to go. It just had to! I heard a few logs tumble, fall and scatter down the roof. With narrowed eyes, I threw myself against it. "Move, god damn you! Fall!"

The pile creaked ominously. It began as a single tumbling log, but was quickly followed by another. A third and fourth tumbled in quick succession, and then the wall I'd been pushing against gave way. Like an avalanche of wood, ice and dust, it rattled down the rooftop. I fell with it, carried along atop the wave. The precipice approached. There would be no time to stop myself, and I wasn't sure I wanted to.

This was all or nothing, after all.

With a quick prayer and gasp, the roof ended – and open air began. My body hung there, free from gravity for a few long moments as I sailed above and over the battle. Everything seemed to be in slow motion, and I was able to turn and look down to the battle below. Ruby's eyes met mine, like tiny specks of silver.

She'd drawn Merlot below me. She'd done it. My eyes traced the huge avalanche of wood as it rained down above him. My armour carried me further, away from him, but the rest would fall like hail across his body.

"Weiss!" I screamed. "Set it alight. Now!"

Red light flared from my left. Heat whistled past me, almost close enough to singe my eyebrows. I didn't care, however. Even as gravity took hold of me and my flight became downwards, I watched with grim satisfaction as timber burst into flame. The curtain of searing fire roared and rolled down atop Merlot's bloated mass.

The screams were indescribable. No lungs large enough to make such a noise could ever be imagined, let alone explained with words. A great pillar of flame engulfed him, and it reached almost ten metres above his already gargantuan form. At least fifty, perhaps sixty metres tall. It was a bonfire the likes of which I'd never seen.