by Max Jager
The elven soldier nodded and placed a hand on Adamus's shoulder, they both focused and the curse was dispelled. "Go back to her, we will handle these things." The soldier stated.
"You're group is getting slaughtered, as much as I want to go back I have to trust Alicia to handle herself for a few seconds. I can't let these things break through to the back lines. They'll tear apart the archers." Adamus stated.
"A lot of normals and lessers did get through and are already after the archers, we are holding the big ones back as long as we can." The soldier informed him.
"You did good. The archers can handle the normals and lessers, they do have a few guards and these new gun things." Adamus replied. With the curse off him he stood up and stumbled a little, it had drained a massive amount of his energy but at least now he could stand and fight. He threw one teleport arrow into the ground under his feet, then drew a second one back on his bow and fired it up into the air. Within a split second he had already drawn and fired another one, this one an air-element arrow, aimed at the three pure demons. Then he pulled another back, this one glowing red, he aimed it at the ground under his feet and waited.
The air-element arrow caught the pure demons by surprise and sent them all stumbling backwards. There hadn't been any archers fighting them a moment ago, so once they regained their footing they skimmed the battlefield searching for said archer. The center one spotted Adamus and called out to its allies, signaling where the elven military commander was while the other two kept the low ranking elves at a distance. Then, suddenly, Adamus disappeared in a flash of light. Adamus teleported to the arrow he had fired into the air, which was now falling down on the pure demons from above. He was already aiming down so as soon as he appeared he fired straight down at the middle pure demon's head at almost point blank range. As soon as he fired the spell came into effect, and the arrow cloned itself seven times, turning into a hail of eight arrows firing down into the pure demon's head. The demon was killed on the spot and Adamus landed on its back, immediately firing another arrow into the side of the left pure demon's head. Adamus jumped off the corpse as the body began to fall over and jumped behind the demons. As he was in mid-air the two pure demons turned to face him and he fired another at the left one's head. This time the left demon saw it and created an ice wall to block it while the right pure demon created a wall of ice spikes behind Adamus.
But as soon as Adamus fired he disappeared in a flash of light again, teleporting back to the one he had dropped and fired again at the back of the left pure demon's head. This was his lightning arrow, the demon didn't know where it was coming from and was unable to dodge, the arrow struck it in the back of the head then it let out a powerful pulse of electricity straight to the beast's brain. The leftmost demon lifelessly collapsed to the ground, the only pure demon remaining frantically started looking around, trying to figure out where the archer had gone this time while at the same time trying to protect itself from the attacks coming at it from all directions by the other elves.
Adamus prepared to fire at the last demon, but he didn't need to. There was too many elves attacking it from too many directions all at once, with guns, swords, and magic. When it had its two allies keeping them back was easy, but fighting alone there was too much going on for one creature to respond to all at once. The elven soldiers struck down the last pure demon without Adamus's help. "Keep pushing forwards. I need to get back to Alicia." Adamus instructed
"What about all the normals who breached the back lines?" One soldier asked.
"Trust the back lines and the guards there to handle themselves. We need to push through the demon forces so when the scientists reach the rift we are close enough to distract the demons close to the rift." Adamus explained, then he disappeared in a flash of light again.
This chapter ended up being 47 pages long (In google docs.) So for the sake of your sanity and mine I have split it into three parts. The first two are here, the next one (with the remaining 17 pages is still being looked over by my beta-reader/friend and will be posted as a new chapter within the next 1-3 days.)
- Next Chapter. Chapter 14.5: The Rift -
Chapter 14,5: The Rift
- Chapter 14.5: The Rift -
[Location: Far Back Lines]
Adamus reappeared where he left his arrow and quickly looked around to find out where Alicia was. He was surprised to see that the greater demon was already dead, but alarmed when he noticed Alicia lying on the ground not moving. Then he spotted the elf in the black robes, the man was lying on his back in the grass about five feet away from Alicia with his massive sword on the ground beside him, his legs crossed, and his arms tucked behind his head as if he was relaxing on a vacation.
"Emmei? What are you doing here? Is Alicia alright?" Adamus called out as he rushed over to Alicia.
"I'm a mercenary Adamus, not one of your soldiers. I go wherever I please." Emmei answered. "And she's still alive. Took quite a beating, but she's alive."
"Did you save her and kill the demon?" Adamus asked.
"Did you pay me to help in any way?" Emmei asked.
"No." Adamus answered.
"There's your answer." Emmei replied. "She killed it on her own. Was a pretty close fight though. I almost stepped in to help you guys, so that's something I guess."
"Why are you here? Did you change your mind about helping us in this battle?" Adamus asked.
"Nah. I knew you guys would be fine without me. However I did come to report where these additional attacks are coming from. The group that snuck up on the outpost this morning, and these ones that came after you. A new rift opened nearby, it is fresh and still very small so unlike this one where many demons can crawl out of it all at once, it hasn't grown enough to let more than one demon at a time out. They're coming outta it, grouping up once they all get out, then are coming in waves to join this battlefield." Emmei explained.
Adamus frowned and looked puzzled. "Someone mentioned that before. We don't have the manpower to take care of that one too. We'll have to just keep watch for flanks from there. Thank you for the information though."
Emmei opened his bag and pulled out a piece of a device. "That's why I got this. I'm going to go shut it down, you can pay me for it later. I stole one of those human rift-zapper things from the village, you really need better security when the soldiers are gone by the way. Then I had a few of the scientists there tell me how to put the pieces together and turn it on. Figured I'd inform you before I went, incase I fail to close it or incase another group comes after you before I get there. The rift is east of here, if any more come they'll come from that direction."
"You can't do that alone." Adamus protested.
"It's a new rift, they can only come out one at a time, and my signet can make me stronger and faster with every blow I land. As long as I can survive the fight with the ones that already got out, and not get hit or miss an attack in the process, by the time I clear them out my signet will be boosting me enough to take on anything that can fit through that portal one on one. Then I just setup the rift-zapper thing and make sure every demon that comes out dies before another can get out." Emmei stated. "The way I see it, I either save the village and get paid a nice sum of crystals, or I die trying. It's a win-win situation really."
"No Emmei, please wait for the soldiers to take this rift out then we'll send a few veterans with you to clean that one up nice and quick." Adamus insisted.
"Again, I'm a mercenary not one of your soldiers. I'm doing it my way, I'll come back and give you a heads up if I take it out." Emmei stated before he picked up his sword and walked away.
Adamus let out a sigh of irritation but let the man go. He had a battlefield to lead, he focused and reconnected to nature again, regaining his vision of the entire battlefield as he resumed leading the elven forces.
[Location: East Flank]
By now the Alphas and the surviving scientist group had been fully healed by Cora and Lillith and were preparing to get moving again. "Alright e
veryone, we are going to sprint the rest of the way." Cora called out. "It is not too much further from here, I am going to use a spell that will make you all much faster. I warn you, if you're not used to moving this fast it'll be hard to control yourself at first so stay focused." She warned as she focused on the spell. Everyone around her could feel a strange tingling feeling in their legs. "Stay close everyone, I'm taking over as lead mage and I'm not a combat mage, so if you stray too far from me I'm going to have a hard time protecting you from incoming fire. Now that we are not invisible, there will be no way we can avoid a fight. Once we reach the rift we can't just secretly close it, we're going to have to fight to defend the machine."
Everyone nodded and moved in closer to Cora and awaited her signal. Once she finished giving everyone the speed buff she shouted out "Go!" and everyone took off running. The four Alphas stumbled at first and fell on their faces, their normal running speed had been increased by forty miles per hour which left most of them running at over fifty miles per hour. It was a drastic change. The elves slowed down a little to give the humans a chance to adjust, but once the Alphas were able to run straight again the entire group sprinted forwards towards the rift. The demons on the battlefield noticed their advance now that they were no longer invisible and began throwing fireballs and ice shards at the group, the group was moving too fast for the demons to chase them down even with the super speed the demons had. As the ice and fire rained down at them Cora flicked her staff and made a tall wall of wood appear beside them. The big wooden wall hovered in the air between the group and the demons and followed them as they ran, blocking the incoming attacks. The demon's fire attacks lit the wall on fire.
"Why didn't we do this from the start?" Estellese asked. "We woulda been there by now."
"The original plan was to use stealth." Esyll answered. "The machine will take time to work, if we just ran over the demons would see us and we'd need to fight them while the machine does it's job. If we used stealth, we could remain invisible and undetected while the machine did its work and we could have completely closed the rift without a single demon even knowing what happened. The stealth plan was clearly much safer and had a higher success rate, but we didn't plan on the light mage being struck down by the crossfire. Now that the stealth plan flopped we will without a doubt have to fight off the demons. I know we lost a lot of people in that fire blast, but I must admit now that we are visible we are likely going to lose a lot more of us before that rift is closed. Be prepared."
"Be positive Esyll!" Cora stated. "You have me here to protect you all, we will be okay. I can hold them back for a while. And I am sure Adamus and Alicia will rejoin the battle any time now, they will surely send backup to aid us." As she spoke she glanced over at Lillith who was being oddly quiet and looked distracted. "Lillith, what's wrong hon?"
Lillith put on a fake smile and looked at Cora as she ran. "I'm fine. No worries."
"It's Alicia, isn't it? I can tell you two are very close." Cora replied in a concerned tone. "She's a tough one, she will be okay."
"She didn't sound okay. She should be back by now." Lillith answered in a quiet, worried tone. "I so badly want to go back and make sure she's okay."
"Then turn and go back. We'll be fine." Cora answered.
Lillith shook her head and showed another fake smile. "I can't. If I turn back to help her now and anyone else in this group died, I would never be able to forgive myself. I know it wouldn't be my fault, but that's just how I am, I would blame myself for not being there to save them. I can't help it. I have to stay and just hope Alicia is okay."
"Don't hope for it, know it. She's with Adamus and a group of guards, and she is one heck of a fighter herself. She IS okay." Cora insisted, although she herself was unsure of Alicia's fate. Any number of things could have happened, it was war after all, all it took was one misstep for even the best of fighters to go down.
They had already been close so with their enhanced speeds they reached the outpost within a few minutes. It was a large wall surrounding the rift with towers on each corner. The walls and towers were mostly destroyed and damaged, there was bodies of elves and demons scattered everywhere. "Our cover is already blown, no sense sneaking in. Just follow my lead I'm bringing us to the rift in the most direct way possible." Cora called out. As they ran straight at the outpost she twirled her crystal staff and pointed at the wall, suddenly a massive tree sprang out of the ground in front of the wall, then unnaturally bent and curved itself over the wall to make a wooden ramp. The group sprinted right up the wooden ramp which lead them over the walls and straight to the rift. It looked like a massive portal on the ground and as they looked down into it they could see the fire and brimstone of the world on the other side, along with thousands of demons marching on the surface of that world. It would seem that the rift was high up in the air over the demonic world.
They stopped once they reached the rift and Cora immediately turned to start surrounding them with layers of wooden walls in hopes of keeping out the demons who no doubt would be closing in on them any second now. "Get the device up and running!" She called out.
Esyll and the other scientists opened their bags and began pulling out the parts and pieces of the machine, each of them had taken a piece to lighten the load on everyone. Then they all got to work alongside Zanath and Lillith constructing the big and bulky machine along with the solar panels needed to power it. They hadn't even gotten close to putting it all together before they could hear the demons hammering away at the wooden walls around them, those walls would not hold them back for long.
"Esyll, can you and the scientists build this without me?" Zanath asked.
"Yes we can. Why?" Esyll asked.
"I'm going to buy us a little more time. Cora can you make a wooden tower?" Zanath asked.
"Can do!" Cora replied as she focused and made a short wooden tower rise out of the ground. She then returned her focus to the walls, using her wood-element magic to repair the walls every time the demons damaged them. It would not make them impenetrable, but it would without a doubt make them hard to break and slow down the demons.
Zanath grabbed his rifle and quickly began climbing up the tower, and before he knew it he saw Lillith zip right past him on her way to the top. She went past too quickly for him to tell her it was dangerous, so he just continued climbing up after her. Once he reached the top he saw Lillith firing off arrows at the demons down below at incredible speeds, and with very good accuracy. She hit every target in the head, or, at least every target that didn't dodge or block her attacks. "you take the left side I'll take the right." Lillith stated.
"On it." Zanath answered. He rested his rifle on the banister of the tower and began taking shots at the demons that were attacking the wall on his side. They were unfamiliar with bullets so most of them had no idea what was hitting them, and because of that they took longer to realize that the attacks were coming from the tower.
On the ground the scientists worked as fast as they could putting the pieces of the machine together. They had it almost completed when three lesser demons climbed out of the rift. "Humans, I'm counting on you to take those things down. They have super speed, strength, and magical skill do NOT underestimate them! They are much stronger then you are, I can't really help I need to keep focused on repairing the walls." Cora called out.
The demons turned to rush at the scientists but Estellese, Mendelen, and Kaden moved in to cut them off. "I don't want to split us up, but if we are going to hold them back we each need to take on one of them." Mendelen stated.
Kaden and Estellese both replied with "Alright" as they split up to each take on their own demon, Kaden took the left, Estellese took the right, and Mendelen took the center.
As the three rushed in Kaden's lesser demon opened up by lobbing three fireballs at him, causing Kaden to quickly jump to the side to get out of the way of all three.
The lesser demon facing Estellese summoned a tall wall of flames between them, then pushed its ar
m forwards to push the wall towards Estellese. Causing Estellese to jump backwards to evade the flames, as she jumped she threw a fireball of her own back at the demon's torso. The demon's fire wall was not a solid object, so her fireball passed clean through it and struck the demon in the chest, burning it slightly. Estellese started running to the side, towards Mendelen, to try and get around the wall.
The lesser demon facing Mendelen began firing off small ice shards at the man as he charged it, but Mendelen pulled down the face-plate on his knight armor and the ice couldn't even scratch his armor. He rushed in close to the demon and the demon shouted something to its ally that was fighting Kaden. As Mendelen moved in for the kill and slashed at the demon's neck the ice demon tucked into a roll and rolled towards Kaden. As it rolled it threw an ice shard for kadin's leg from the side.
Kaden had been focused on his own demon and hadn't seen the attack coming. The thin 3 inch long ice shard stabbed into his leg and he shouted out in pain. The fire demon in front of him took the opportunity to slash at Kaden's neck while he recoiled in pain, but suddenly a metal hook came flying from Mendelen and stabbed into the fire-demon's shoulder. In one swift movement Mendelen yanked the chain attached to the hook, yanking the fire-demon away from Kaden and pulling it to the ground before it could hit him.