by Elian Tars
“It’s impolite to keep people waiting.” Horn chuckled. “Let’s go tear them apart. I doubt they can deal with us. And if their mistress shows up, the Gods will cover us.”
“There’s no need in risking for no reason, Mister Horn.” Dunker shook his shaved head. “It’ll be much better to wait for reinforcements.”
“So that we can lose more people?” Horn said dryly.
The monk shrugged. “We’re at war. People are born and people die. This is what balance is.”
“Having a good fight is good, but dying... is not,” Horn retorted. “The dead, with rare exceptions, can’t enjoy life.”
“Enough,” I ordered, interrupting their philosophical banter. “We’ll wait...”
“Careful...” The Bat fluttered its wings. “Fifty more... are coming... from the right...”
“Everyone, get ready for a fight!” Horn reacted at once, turning toward the indicated direction in order to be the first to meet the enemy.
“They’re running... quickly...”
Horn chuckled through clenched teeth. “What a tactic! My friends, it’s time for slaughter!”
Before the enemies rushed at us from behind the trees, I thought whether I did the right thing coming here. And no matter how many times I went over different scenarios in my head, this one always stood out as the best option. Letting the reinforcements go before us would mean sending them to their death. Our enemy must’ve sent their best warriors here if Aerida was covering them. Even if I had waited for the reinforcements and came here with them, if Aerida appeared they would’ve...
We were too strong for them to kill us quickly. And the reinforcements were very close. If we needed them, they’d come here in no time.
A level 90 warrior shrouded in red haze launched at us with a roar from behind a pine tree.
Chapter 26
A Bloody Battle
If our situation wasn’t so serious and the battle for Beldera, the victory in which would open us a way to the capital, so important, I would’ve chuckled. Seeing a mountain of a man run at us with a sword above his head and shouting a battle cry turn around at full speed and, still roaring, rush at his friends was hilarious.
Una, even more eager than Horn, was the first of us to attack, and she took control over the most zealous opponent.
“Oh, finally!!!” Horn cried happily, rushing forward. His skin, which was already a ghastly bluish hue, began to glow with the cold light common for the Element of Death. He covered the distance between him and the attackers in two leaps and, getting in front of them, began to spin like a deadly top. With every second, he released more and more energy, until his body was fully covered with blue flames that mixed with the crimson of his dying opponents.
“Dunker, go!” I ordered and rushed to assist Horn. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the hesitant glance he threw in Tiara’s direction. Overcoming his doubts, he hurried to fulfill my order. Though Caer had ordered him to look after Tiara, that didn’t mean that he had the right to ignore my orders on the battlefield.
Speaking of Tiara, she didn’t seem to be in a hurry to join the fight, but she wasn’t standing idly either. When Horn’s poleax shed its first blood, she raised both of her hands to the sky. At first, nothing happened, but when I got closer to our enemies, I noticed thin streams of blood running across the ground toward her.
I wonder what she’s capable of in a fight...
A black arrow whizzed past my head, leaving a trail of smoke behind it. It disappeared in front of the face of a large woman with two swords. Dissolving into smoke, it entered her forehead and shot out of her nape half a second later. Without slowing down, it flew to the next target. The trail, which was now some sixty feet long, connected them all, stringing them like beads on a necklace. Having become a Follower of the Old Man, Omarh’s skills transformed accordingly.
You have dealt 1,084 points of damage.
You have dealt 100 points of damage to the secondary target.
You have dealt 100 points of damage to the secondary target.
You have dealt 100 points of damage to the secondary target.
I immediately attacked my first enemy — a thin man with a painted face and two axes. Three black beams shot out of his back, hitting three of his comrades. I easily dodged one of his axes and counterattacked at once. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the red haze to the left of me and cast Tranquility with my left hand without even looking. The skill, upgraded to the maximum, had a seventy-five percent chance to inflict Horror.
And that’s exactly what happened.
The battle was intense. I dodged one attack after another, occasionally jumping on the shoulders or heads of my enemies, counter-attacking quickly, and pushing off, landing either on the ground, or onto the next victim. Somewhere at the back of my mind, I had a thought that with my Acrobatics I could join a circus after the war and live rather comfortably.
Next to me, covered in black smoke from head to toe, Vella was tearing apart her enemy; Horn was grinning madly to the left of her, swinging his poleax as if it weighed no more than a fork. Seeing him fend off berserks, I kept thinking how his battle fervor had finally met its match. Noriduel’s Followers loved a good fight, but they usually didn’t savor it like Bers’s Followers did, as their favorite occupation was enjoying life as they had only one. But Horn knew that if he died again, Kane would raise him from the grave. And that meant that he could cut down his enemies without fearing for his life. This revelation made Horn enjoy the slaughter much more than his enemies, whose faith was based on savoring every drop of blood spilled, did.
Dunker, like many Followers of Guer-Shui, used his body as his weapon, dealing quick hits with both his arms and legs. His fighting style looked beautiful. And although it wasn’t as spectacular as Horn’s rampage was, it was just as effective.
Una, as usually, controlled her enemies, making them attack each other. Omarh demonstrated his skills, shooting quickly and accurately, sometimes pouring a whole hail of arrows upon his enemies. Tiara stood still, gathering blood, gradually forming a crimson whirlwind around her, waiting for her moment to strike.
Clot of Darkness.
I threw my “elemental bomb” into the crowd. It didn’t knock anyone out, but it did deal quite a lot of damage. I immediately followed up with Tranquility, casting it into the face of the bald, sturdy fellow that had attacked me. The skill’s debuff effect triggered, inflicting Contagious Horror. Shrieking in fear, the man turned around and rushed toward his friends, trying to get through them and get as far away from here as possible, successfully “infecting” three more. It was nice to watch the red haze around the enemies grow dimmer as they lost their desire to fight. I wished the effect lasted longer.
Though the enemy outnumbered us, we were winning due to our higher average level (which meant bigger amount of HP and bigger amount damage dealt) and arsenal of skills.
Despite all of that, I couldn’t say that the fight was easy. The damned berserks got stronger and quicker as they lost HP. I counted four different “stages” of their madness, appearing at seventy-five, fifty, twenty-five, and ten percent of their HP respectively. On the last stage, a level 90 fighter with average gear dealt more damage with a basic attack than I did with my high stats. And they moved pretty fast, so I wasn’t always able to dodge them.
“Archers... close....” the Bat reported.
“Get ready! Arrows are coming!” I shouted.
“I’ll cover you!” Tiara immediately answered.
Aerida’s Followers had taken their positions and started shooting. The jade rays of their arrows covered the sky. For a few seconds it even got darker, as if a cloud had covered the sun.
A moment later, it got completely dark. A blood-red dome that didn’t let the light through covered the battlefield.
Though the fight was still raging, I clearly heard Una’s voice. She was standing a little behind me. “It reeks!”
The blood that the protective dome wa
s made of wasn’t fresh. It stunk like we were at the butcher’s.
“That’s great, Tiara! Good job!” I shouted, hiding the fact that the smell was making my stomach turn.
“I need more... blood!!!” she wheezed. I glanced at her and frowned. She was pale and leaning to the left, her hands still up. Protecting us from a whole squad of archers must’ve taken quite the toll on her.
I reacted quickly. Grabbing one of the enemies who had a couple of hundred HP left by the armor, I threw him toward her.
“Omarh! Finish him off!”
There was no lack of blood on the battlefield, but Tiara had to gather it from afar which took a lot of energy and concentration. I thought that it’d be much more effective if she had a fresh source of it nearby.
I didn’t know exactly what Omarh’s finisher was although I did see it in action. Everyone who had specialized in shooting had at least two types of finishers. Of course, just like everyone else, they could unlock more, but that was a story for some other time. According to Berg, a close-combat archer finisher was pretty coldblooded.
And Omarh’s was no exception. Immediately taking out his dagger, he lowered the berserk’s HP down to one point with one strike. Calmly and emotionlessly, he cut his throat.
A stream of blood rushed up to the sky at once and hit the dome. Both the stream and the blood that had remained in the corpse became Tiara’s source of power. I was right to think that having a source close to her was more convenient.
However, I wasn’t the only one who noticed that.
“Omarh, take another one!” Subduing two enemies at once, Una threw them together with another barely alive victim to our archer.
Dodging the mace of a muscled shorty with a nasty scar on his cheek, I hit him in the chest with the Trident and immediately cast Tranquility at a red-haired beast with a two-handed sword who tried to attack Vella from behind. Horror triggered, and the girl ran away. I dodged the mace once again, this time half-turning to the left and, pushing off the ground, soared up into the sky like a bird to avoid getting hit by a scythe and a poleax. Unfortunately, gravity was a thing, meaning that I had to get back down again. Doing so, I cut the guy with the scar twice with the trishula.
Suddenly, all three of my opponents were pierced from above with blood-red spears. Looking up, I noticed that the enemy arrows we’re no longer trying to get through the dome, which meant that Tiara could switch to offensive.
“Have the reinforcements arrived?” I asked the Bat without looking at it, finishing off my opponent with a swing of the trishula.
“Yes...”
“Great!!! Guys! Let’s push them back!!!” I shouted, encouraging them. “It’s time to wrap it up here!”
We could win. The difference between our forces was enormous. Their most powerful warrior was a level 102 scary-looking guy with a burnt head and about 5,000 HP. It’d take me about six hits to knock him out. He dealt a little more than 300 damage without using strengthening (I missed one of his attacks), which meant that he’d have to hit me, at a rough estimate, about forty times. Unfortunately for him, I, like all of our people, had increased regeneration, and they had no healers.
The road to victory couldn’t be called a walk in the park, but we weren’t busting our asses either. And that bothered me a little. Why were almost a hundred berserks and archers hiding in the forest? What was our enemy counting on? Didn’t they know that my super-elite squad was covering our troops? I doubted that their reconnaissance squad was so bad at its job.
I thought about what would’ve happened had we not noticed anything and weren’t expecting an attack from behind. These guys were very strong by local standards. They were stronger than elite guards, and a hundred times stronger than common warriors. In theory, they could’ve given us a lot of trouble had they attacked us from behind. But they would’ve still suffered great loses... Was that what they were counting on? Had Rheingeit ordered Bers and Aerida to send their Followers to their deaths in order to thin out our troops and thus make defending Longera easier? From what I knew about him, such a tactic did fit him. And his choice of victims was perfect: bloodthirsty berserkers who cared not about their lives, stealthy rogues to support them, and archers to finish off whatever the previous two groups couldn’t and provide an extra layer of protection.
But try as I might, I still couldn’t understand what exactly they were aiming for. And before I could get to the bottom of it, my pondering was interrupted by pain that struck every nerve in my body.
A message flashed before me, its contents no less pleasant.
You have fallen under the effect of “Bers’s Aura.” You will receive 150 points of damage for every second spent within its range.
You have received 150 points of damage.
Chapter 27
The Wizard
“Retreat! Quickly!” I cried, wincing from pain.
I felt sick, like my innards were being squeezed with cold hands. I wanted nothing more than to scream and lie down on the ground, wait for it all to pass... but I pushed on. I found that being under the influence of an Aura hurt less than it did before. As the Old Man grew stronger, so did I.
Wheezing, I dodged a hit aimed at my stomach and counterattacked.
Power Strike.
Yanking out the trishula out of my enemy’s stomach, I made a triple backflip, putting some distance between us.
And then I saw him.
Bers appeared in flesh and blood above the heads of his Followers. Clad in red scaled armor and shouldering his guandao, he floated in my direction. I could see the predatory grin hidden in his wild beard.
“The Great Bers! Praise the Great Bers!!!” his Followers shouted furiously, launching themselves at us again and again.
“Horn, retreat, damn you!!!” I roared, seeing that he was in no hurry to do so. “Una!”
“Aye!” she cried readily and filled his nostrils with the lilac sand, making him turn around and run.
“Milady, hurry up!” Dunker, who didn’t think about arguing with me, had already caught up with Tiara and was now dragging her by the hand.
I quickly analyzed the situation. Out of our entire team, only I could stood a chance against a God, so the only thing we could do was to run. I was sure that our enemy, inspired by their Patron’s appearance, wouldn’t let us leave so easily and that Bers could catch up to us in one leap if he decided to do so.
Where the hell are our Gods? They promised to help!
“AAAA!!!” I cried at the top of my lungs, falling to my knees.
You have fallen under the effect of “Mavia’s Aura.” You will receive 250 points of damage for every second spent within its range.
You have received 250 points of damage.
I was almost a foot away from Tiara when her Goddess appeared near her, getting between us and making me feel almost the maximum effect of her divine Aura. There was nothing else to do but activate...
Twilight Wanderer.
“Please, tell them to leave,” I asked her once I’ve entered the Twilight, knowing she could see me even there.
“Retreat,” she said in a voice that bore no argument, glancing at my comrades. “Ken will be fine.”
And so they did.
Left without its source of power, the dome had turned into a bubble with tentacles and was now fighting off our pursuers. Omarh was shooting back on the run, and Una was having fun controlling a couple of berserkers and throwing them under the feet of their comrades. Horn, still under Una’s control, Vella and Dunker were focused on retreating.
I’m sure that they’ll manage...
“Mavia,” Bers said, hovering a small distance away from her. “It’s good to see you.”
“You, too, brother.”
I remembered from Biergein’s memories that the Gods called each other brothers and sisters but I didn’t know if they were truly blood related. The two could easily turn out to be siblings — they both liked red clothes and were crazy about blood. Their skills had a sim
ilar color scheme that differed only in shades — Bers’s were darker, closer to currant, and Mavia’s were something between blood-red and crimson.
What am I on about? I’m no artist, I don’t know a damn thing about different shades of color...
“Have you come to fight me?” Bers asked, licking his lips.
If I stood at one place, Wanderer lasted longer, but thirty seconds were far from being an eternity. I knew that I’d have to leave soon but I was dying to know what would happen next. Push comes to shove, I had the Amulet and the Small Avatar.
“If I have to. But it’d be much better if you left Rheingeit and joined us.”
“Hah! You’re still afraid to fight your own brother! But you’ll have to, Mavia! Because I’m here to stain my blade with fresh blood!”
“And for that the mighty Bers is ready to attack his own sister?” Lilac sand swirled near Mavia, as if brought here by the wind from where my friends were running. “Are you ready to spill your own blood?” Rugus continued, having fully materialized. He bowed to Mavia, nodded to me, and smiled to Bers.
“So you’ve shown up, you sly fox.” Bers made a wry face. “I’ll happily spill your blood.”
Wanderer had stopped working a few seconds ago, so I put some distance between the trio and me and was now watching them from afar, feeling discomfort and losing fifty HP every second.
I felt two new powerful presences nearby. Almost simultaneously, both sides got reinforcements.
“Hello, everyone!” Noriduel smiled appearing in his true form and waving his glaive in greeting. “Shall we start a friendly quarrel? Or shall we have a talk and go home?”
“We haven’t come here to talk, you drunkard,” Aerida huffed arrogantly, “but to punish the traitors! Well, where’s your Ancient One? Has he chickened out?”
“And where’s your Rheingeit?” Noriduel chuckled.
Aerida made a wry face and turned away. Her gaze stopped at me and she smiled broadly.
