The second knight was on Sonder already.
But now that she knew that they weren't living things, not truly, she would destroy them in an instant.
She thrust one hand forward toward the knight, fingers splayed.
Ice bloomed immediately.
It was a roaring and solid cold, the air crystallizing around the knight.
He struggled with monotone action. The ice groaned, and fractures spider-webbed across the surface, but it held long enough.
A perfect barrier prison locked itself around the knight. It was bigger than the one she conjured before.
The knight hit the barrier twice, but it was no use.
Then Sonder changed the temperature.
She lifted her staff, and fire ignited within the prison.
It wasn't just heat but an intense, contained, swirling storm of fire. It was violent and compressed, like explosions.
The ice vanished, and then metal followed.
The armor glowed a white-hot red and then warped, folded, and melted. It didn't take long before it ran like water against the floor of the barrier.
The sword it held fell to the ground, already half-melted, and then even the stone inside the armor failed.
She released the spell.
The barrier vanished.
What remained spilled outward in a smoking heap; just slag and twisted metal now.
Sonder stood still. Heat shimmered faintly around her, fading as she let the magic dissipate.
She and her sword of light shrank back to their normal selves, and she sheathed the sword.
Adjusting her grip on her staff, she began to walk toward the throne.
During the fight, she had been pushed back to the entrance, and she only made it halfway across the floor when it slammed open.
More dark knights. Four of them.
They emerged without ceremony, swords already in hand, forming a loose ring around her path.
She stopped.
They charged.
Sonder did not retreat, nor did she stop.
As she had found her determination and was lifted of the weight of thinking she'd have to kill, they were easily dispatched.
She conjured a few small barriers and let them rotate around her, leaving whirling death to anyone that approached.
If they tried to jump over them and dash under them, she simply changed their direction.
The knights fell one after another. They simply ceased to function.
Metal rang and scattered across the stone floor, piling in dark, lifeless heaps. No blood. No cries. Only the sound of stone and metal meeting the floor, again and again.
When the last knight fell, Sonder stood alone once more.
The distance to the throne felt shorter now. The red light was gone entirely, replaced by the pale, even glow that filled the room. The man watched her approach, his posture unchanged, but his eyes followed her closely.
She stopped a few steps from the throne.
"So," A voice came, but not from the man. It was just in the room, coming from everywhere and nowhere. The voice was that of an old man, dry and resonant. "A worthy soul has come."