The Dungeon Tree

"Felix… are you alive?" I called out.

My vision had been obscured by the giant cloud of dust created from the impact of the crash. At best, I could only see a couple feet ahead of me.

"Screw you!" Felix's voice shouted out from my left.

"I'll take that as a yes." I said, closing my eyes and slumping my head onto the ground.

Once again, I felt an entire jolt like sensation course throughout my body. I instantly jumped to my feet and reached for Genki. Despite placing my hand where he should be, I felt nothing. I looked down to see what the hold up was and realized that Genki was nowhere even near me. I was holding him while we were falling so he shouldn't have been too far at least.

"Stop running around through the smoke and help me out over here!" Felix shouted.

I turned towards Felix's voice with a confused expression on my face. I hadn't even taken a step yet. Just what exactly was he talking about? The hairs on the back of my neck began to stand. The presence of something behind me caused me to turn around just in time to see razor sharp claws shoot out from the dust, just barely scratching my face before returning back into the dust cloud.

"Felix, can you blow this dust away? I can't see anything!" I asked desperately, looking around for where the monster might strike next.

"If I could I would but I can't move from underneath this rubble. I need you to get me out of here!" Felix shouted back.

"Kinda hard to do that when a monster keeps jumping out and attacking me!" I quickly ducked underneath a slash attack before jumping back in the hopes of creating at least some distance.

"Can't you just cast an explosion to create winds to push the dust away?"

"No can do. If I use any magic, I run the risk of collapsing." Right as I said that, the monster's claws scratched my side.

"Did you seriously use up all your magic to get over to me?!" Felix asked with an annoyed pitch.

"No, I was in a fight before I got here so I was never at one hundred percent to begin with!"

I could hear Felix's loud groan of annoyance from all the way over here. If he kept that up, the monster might start targeting him next. I needed to make sure to not let that happen though. He was the key to blowing this dust away.

All my dodges so far had been due to luck and my quick reaction speed, but eventually I needed to find a solid way to avoid the monster's attacks. It moved too quietly to try and pick up on any weird noises and I could rely on my eyes because of how thick the dust was.

My eyes widened at the sudden idea that had popped in my head. I couldn't afford to cast any explosions recklessly but I could create flames that wouldn't take much energy out of me.

"Let's hope this works." I said to myself, aiming my right hand towards the ground.

Small sized flames began to appear around me, creating a makeshift ring of sorts. The flames were easy to put out with how little magic I put into them but that would hopefully work out in my favor.

As I stood there patiently, it finally happened. The flame to my left had been extinguished. I turned towards where the extinguished flame was and curled my open hand into a fist, swinging as hard as I could. The feeling of fur on my knuckles told me all I needed to know. The monster fell back, giving me just enough time to run over to where Felix's voice had come from and use the last of my magic to cast an explosion to blow off all the debris.

Right as the debris was removed, Felix raised his hand and shot a gust of wind upward, blowing away all the dust and finally allowing me to see more than five feet.

"Thank you. Now allow me to take it over from here." Felix said, jumping up to his feet.

"I do recall you saying something about you wanting to get back at this thing by tenfold." I said with a smile.

"I'll make sure to keep good on my word."