Cleansing Fire

by D. L. Harrison

  The spells were done by the time we got outside about ten seconds later, and I scanned the sky for our enemies. There were eight smaller dragons, which was a relief, I’d been a little afraid there were more not present when we saw them the first time. The large ancient red was there as well.

  The guards were already firing up at them with spells and arrows. Unfortunately, the dragons were extremely fast, and only came into range of the guard’s weapons and spells when strafing the city. Were none of them past apprentice? Apparently not.

  Fortunately, I didn’t have a range for spells, not after journeyman, and now we were all experts. All I had to do was see the bastards.

  “Follow my lead, one at a time, no fire.”

  Dan gave me a no shit look, and I shrugged in apology.

  Then I sent two ice spikes worth ten thousand mana each at the same small dragon. The first hit for over forty thousand damage, which immediately destroyed its mana shield. The second hit less than a second later, and it stabbed into the dragon’s side and exploded. With no resistance against the Water Sphere, it should have done over forty thousand damage, but it didn’t. It only did ten thousand six hundred and forty-two. The only thing I could guess, was that its extremely high armor class made it take quarter damage. Most likely, all the damage done, or the lion’s share of it, was from the inherent mana invested in the spell as water magic, while the ice itself simply didn’t penetrate very far.

  Fortunately, armor couldn’t stop pure energy, or a pure magic spell. The others would have better luck.

  Gwen’s shadow spike fired from her hand, and sunk into the young red dragon, and it roared in pain. Then Cassie lifted a hand and struck it with lightning, at the same time Steve nailed it with a life drain and rotting spell. That should have been more than enough to put it down, but it was sixty percent resistant to all the other spheres.

  Then Dan fired a stone spike the size of a javelin and impaled the dragon through the neck. I actually winced when it exploded, the dragon’s head fell forward and hung, barely connected to its body by a few scales and a small strip of flesh, as the then dead carcass started to fall from the sky.

  The other dragons strafed the city and the guards on the walls, but one of them broke off as they noticed their sibling fall and came straight for us. We stood in the center of the market street, fortunately all the customers and merchants had already run for cover.

  I waited until it breathed in deeply, and then I built an ice wall with control water to hold it up in the sky. It was thirty by thirty, and two feet thick. That was another advantage to the preset attack spells, I could build another spell in reserve, without worrying about offense. My only concern at that point was mana management during a fight.

  It didn’t last very long. The ice wall exploded and turned to steam, then our bodies were bathed in white hot fire. My mana shield was fifty thousand, and it dropped to just under forty. Obviously, the ice wall had helped blunt the attack. Probably by quite a bit.

  It’d also been about five seconds since we’d joined the battle, which meant my just under forty thousand mana dedicated to fighting had regenerated. Well, the twenty thousand of it that I had used. The other nineteen thousand was my reserve in case of serious emergency.

  As the dragon’s flight cleared the steam and it flew overhead and came into view, I shot two more ice spikes in under a second, each with ten thousand mana. Like the first dragon, the first ice spike demolished its mana shield. The second did a little over ten thousand in damage.

  The rest of my party started to follow up on that one like the first, and I turned my gaze to the walls as I pre-cast another ice wall spell, but I held back from releasing it.

  One part of the southern wall was completely blown apart, and there was fire and death. It wasn’t all that far away from where we’d stood, the market was right inside the gate, which was on the southern wall, the north side had a gate too, that led to the dock district. There were also some fires throughout the city.

  I cringed as a dragon swooped down and chomped a guard in half. All those dragon jokes, about humans being good with ketchup, were apparently true. Except, it didn’t seem nearly so funny then, it was damned horrifying. The dragon swept another guard into its claws as it rose back toward the sky, and it flipped the screaming guard through the air straight at the maw of its brother. That was just… wrong.

  My head turned just as Cassie released a ball lightning that hit the second dragon. The coruscating bright white lightning ran up and down its body for a few seconds, and the dragon fell from the sky. I’d missed the rest of the party’s attacks checking out the wall, but the others had obviously gotten in their licks. Two down, six to go, not counting the ancient.

  The ancient dragon was flying high in the sky, and not really participating. Almost like… a parent taking their kids to the park to play in the sandbox. I wasn’t going to complain though, I was sure that dragon could destroy the whole city, probably in a single attack.

  One thing was kind of clear, the dragons were limited to the Fire Sphere, manipulating and detecting raw magic, and physical damage through claws and jaws.

  We all turned to look toward the wall as the ancient dragon let out a terrifying and very loud roar. I actually froze a second, and my sphincter locked up tight. Except… it wasn’t a call to attack, the dragons wheeled as one in the sky, and took off south. I guess the little ones got blooded, and enough to eat. I wasn’t sure if us killing two of them factored in or not. The dragons could fly fast, obviously they had some magic to enhance their flight, because they were out of sight in seconds. A few of them had been carrying soldiers in their claws, some dead, some obviously still alive and squirming. Regardless, it answered the question on how we were followed, they were much faster than I’d expected, and I bet the ancient dragon’s ability to feel magic had allowed it to track us even at the much higher speeds which left him behind.

  Damn dragons.

  We all froze then, as we were inundated with the usual popups, and the sub-concepts for level thirty-six. We’d gotten a million experience for driving them off, and four thousand more for the two kills, which I thought was a lot. But I wasn’t going to argue. I also broke a couple of plateaus. Over a hundred thousand mana now, and over ten thousand hit points.

  I put sixty thousand in my mana shield. That left me just under fifty-seven thousand for fights. I did that so I could burn thirty thousand in a fight, and also keep twenty seven thousand in reserve. It would take seven to eight seconds to regen that thirty thousand, less than five for twenty.

  I supposed the only real change was I was willing to rapid fire three ice spikes with ten thousand mana at a time now, instead of just two.

  “Fires, and wounded,” I said shortly.

  Everyone returned my angry gaze, and they nodded in agreement to my three-word plan. None of us were happy with what’d happened, even though we’d already decided it was what needed to happen and the best way to fight them. It’d been easy to take them one at a time, while the rest had been busy eating guards, and taking loot. I imagine they’d throw up the armor, weapons, and gold when they got back to their lair.

  I took a moment to recast my mass heal so it would heal everyone, instead of just members of my party, then we ran off into the city to put out fires. We’d go to the wall last, the innocents came first. I wasn’t unfeeling toward the soldiers suffering, but that was their job, to protect the city and its people.

  It took a while to run it all down, dragon fire liked to keep burning. Dan and I used control fires to put them out, while Lara and I healed anyone we got within sixty feet of. I had thirty-nine thousand available mana, all healing four points of health each. More than that, my mana regen was ridiculous now, and I was gaining back around thirty-two hundred mana a second. I wasn’t worried about running out, even healing twenty or so at a time, my mana barely dipped for a split second, and Lara was healing half of them.

  The dead… there were too many of those. Sure, s
everal hundred out of a hundred thousand or so wasn’t going to destroy the city, but I still hated it.

  Eventually, we did get to the walls, but there wasn’t much to do. They already had the fires out, and their own healers with the Life Sphere had taken care of the wounded soldiers. The walls were still in shambles, but I was sure it would get repaired as soon as the city’s master deigned to get off his ass. The walls couldn’t be repaired with earth magic until the grand enchantment was temporarily turned off. Something only those keyed to the enchantment could do.

  I didn’t even bother talking to them, and the guards were far too busy with the aftermath to thank us for our help. Besides, I was just selfish enough to not want the knowledge that we woke them to get around, and it wouldn’t take too many questions for the guards to come to that conclusion. Selfish? Maybe. I called it prudent, they didn’t really like the undying there in Lerus to begin with, but at least we didn’t end up at Velus first.

  Regardless, I knew we should incorporate the new sub-concepts, but I wanted those dragons dead before they attacked another city. It could wait, we were powerful enough to do the job, and that one damned point of base mana for a measly four extra damage wasn’t going to make too much of a difference. Not when I was firing spells with ten thousand mana. If we leveled again… well, it wouldn’t be the first time we’d had to catch up on two levels of concepts, and once the dragons were gone, we could relax for a day or two, and catch up. It wasn’t worth doing, if more innocents were going to die.

  “New plan, but it’s crazy. I just don’t want to see this again.”

  Cassie snickered, but there was no true humor in it.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Well, before we could either fight them in a city, or in the air and die. But that was before. Now that they have food and loot, they’re going to head back to their lair for a while. We have a pretty good idea where that lair is. Let’s go fight them there, kill those last six bastards, before they decide to attack another city, one we won’t be there to help protect.”

  Gwen said, “Attacking dragons in their lair, where their hoard is? That does sound crazy, I’m in.”

  I chuckled.

  Lara said sadly, “I’m in too, I don’t want to see this again.”

  Dan replied, “Let’s go kill the bastards.”

  Steve nodded, “I’m ready, we can level later.”

  I hadn’t thought anyone would’ve objected to my crazy half-baked plan, but it’d still been good to hear.

  “Alright, let’s make the plan on the way. I don’t think it should be too hard to find the place. There’s probably a big hole on the side of one of the mountains near the ship incident, one big enough to fit that ancient dragon. They’re all restricted to fire, which means their lairs are dug out with claws, and they probably only conceal the entrance during torpor.”

  I hoped. Otherwise they dig out and collapse the entrance every time they go in. I really doubted they’d bother. Who would be crazy enough to attack a dragon lair anyway?

  The guards didn’t say anything to us, as we left the city and headed toward the ship. As usual, it was buried about a quarter mile out. Part of that was security and not advertising the ability, part of that was also habit.

  We got a bit of a surprise when we got there. The ship was halfway out of the ground, covered in vines two inches thick, with thorns the size of small spikes. There were also two men, strangled and perforated by the vines, and lots of blood. They must have seen us come in, and they’d gone to steal it. The security enchantment wouldn’t have responded to merely looking, only if they tried to get in.

  “Damn thieves.”

  Gwen snorted, “At least we know your security system works.”

  I nodded, and then cast growth. The vines unwrapped themselves from around the ship, and they allowed the corpses to drop to the ground. Then they wrapped around the corpses and pulled them down under the earth, along with themselves. Then I cast control water, to clean up the blood.

  With a thought, the ship rose the rest of the way out of the earth, and the canopy popped open. Connecting to any enchantment within our sixty-foot aura could come in handy on occasion, we only needed Dan to bury it, any of us could get it out of the ground.

  Dan cleared his throat, and a few pieces of gold and silver flew out of the ground and into his hands.

  “You forgot to loot.”

  I snickered, and we all piled into the ship.

  Chapter Twelve

  Gwen took my hand, squeezed it, and didn’t let go as I took the ship up and started south.

  I didn’t object, it was a comfort to us both. Sometimes I hated this world, but I had to admit there was a lot I loved about it too, Gwen rated all the way at the top on that second list.

  “Plan?” she asked in a soft voice.

  “Go in, kill the young dragons, run like hell from the ancient dragon.”

  Gwen snorted, “You can do better than that.”

  I nodded, “Maybe, we have no idea what’s down there. For all we know they have gray dwarf slaves to set up traps, and to clean the blood from underneath their claws. Who knows?”

  Ok, probably not, but we couldn’t say for sure.

  “Seriously though. The plan is that, and to rescue any soldiers that might still be alive. I get the idea they prefer their food fresh, so there’s a chance some are still alive. We’ll go in cloaked, and we’ll see what kind of setup they have. The ancient will no doubt feel us, but the young dragons won’t. The worst that happens is he calls us on it, the best that could happen is he’ll think it’ll be a good lesson for the younger dragons and leave us be. At least, until we start killing.”

  “That’s crazy,” Cassie said.

  I shrugged, “The evil races don’t seem to care much about their young, the strong survive. Not to be an ass, but the elves didn’t seem so different, in regards to the goblin cave. They might love their kids, and raise them well, but they also test them against the world to force them to grow. I didn’t see their masters going out to save the weaker ones that died either. I’m hoping if we don’t attack the ancient directly, he’ll leave us alone. Also, very important, don’t touch the hoard, or even go near it if possible, or he probably will attack us.”

  Gwen snickered, “So he’ll defend his stuff, but not his kids?”

  I nodded slowly, “As insane as the idea sounds, it fits what we know, and what happened back at the city. The ancient dragon didn’t even blink at us, and we killed two of his flight. Of course, if I’m wrong, we stone and ice wall the passage to buy a second or two, and then run like hell. There’s no way we can fight that thing. At least, not without getting very lucky.”

  “Lucky?” Dan asked.

  I shrugged, “Eye shot, without using magic. The ancient’s mana shield is impossibly large, and I bet he regens more mana a second than all of us combined could damage him. A physical attack though would ignore that shield completely, except it needs to be immediately mortal, like through the eye into the brain, or maybe his heart? Though it seems to me the latter would be far harder to penetrate than an eye. I bet his health regen is too crazy to, otherwise.”

  Cassie giggled, “You’ve gone around the bend, Jason.”

  I shrugged, “We’d have five shots at it, no magic. Your or Gwen’s arrow, Steve’s crossbow bolt, my control water can make an ice spike which I can throw with magic, as long as there’s no magic in the ice when it gets there his mana shield won’t stop it. Lastly, Dan can do the same with a stone spear, using control earth to toss it instead of stone spike. Unlike the magical versions, we have to aim.”

  It was nuts of course, and it would never work. But it was within the realm of possibility, just like that random arrow that got me in the throat during the siege of the small fort just east of the elven forest.

  I sighed, “So we sneak in if we can, and take them down one at a time. Like in the city, I’ll lead the attack and take down the mana shield. I’ll also shield with an ice wa
ll when they spit fire at us. Since all six of them will be facing us at once most likely, we’ll be in far more danger. I added an ice wall with control water in it to my two attack spells, I’ll do my best to block what I can. So with healing, I’ve got four maintained spells right now. That way we can take five or six hits, instead of one, before we lose our mana shield. Also, the new version is three feet thick, instead of two, so it might do better that way.”

  Gwen snorted, “Your mana shield maybe, I’ll be able to take three.”

  I smiled, they were more balanced than me. None of them had as much mana, but they all had at least three times the hit points.

  “Maybe, but with only taking twenty percent fire damage, and your much higher hit points, it will more than even out. Back to the plan. The bad part about the ice wall defense is we’ll be underground, so the steam won’t disperse quickly, which will make it difficult to see after a while.”

  I took a breath, and let that sink in.

  “Lara will be boosting our stats, and also using her blinding trick once their mana shield is gone. We’ll both be on healing if anyone is injured. If anyone dies, the battle is over. We grab the bodies and run. If either Lara or I are alive, we can reverse it within the two minutes on the run back to the ship. You all throw whatever spells you think best, if two are close enough together for area attacks on the ground in a cavern, we’ll do that and try two at once. Any suggestions?”

  Lara shrugged, “We won’t know until we see what we’re up against, and how the lair is set up. We’ll have to improvise.”

  I nodded, “Hopefully they’ll have separate dens, and we can get it down to five, or maybe even four, before we have to face more than one at a time, but you’re right, there’s no point in further speculation until we see it. That’s why I’m hoping the ancient won’t reveal our presence unless we try to steal his or her stuff, which we won’t. It’ll give us a little time for last minute tweaking.”