Chapter 55: Breaking The Horde

Blood shot into the sky like a fountain.

Frey landed beside the fallen monster as its headless body crashed onto the grass, then immediately crouched beside the injured Walker. The man was conscious, but every breath came through clenched teeth, one arm wrapped instinctively across his ribs. Frey caught him beneath the shoulder and dragged him clear before another charging beast could turn the rescue into a second disaster. Two support Walkers rushed over. One seized the wounded man while the other raised a round shield between them and the fighting.

"His ribs are broken, but he can still move his legs," Frey told them, already turning back toward the battlefield. "Get him behind the formation before something else decides to finish the job."

The shield bearer nodded and withdrew with his partner. Frey had barely recovered his swords when Jet arrived from the right, the Vorpal Blade streaked dark with blood. There was no time to check on each other. A cluster of four Lesser Monsters was pushing through the gap created by the evacuation: two lean predators covered in hooked scales, a broad six-legged beast with tusks along its jaw, and something resembling a flightless bird standing nearly three meters tall, its featherless neck protected by rings of blue chitin.

Jet pointed with his blade. "I’ll take the scaled pair. Hold the big one long enough for the others to collapse on it, and watch that bird’s legs. Those claws are longer than my forearm."

Frey gave a short nod. "Then stop admiring them and move."

They separated.

Jet met the first scaled predator head-on. It sprang low, foreclaws carving trenches through the blood-soaked soil, while its companion circled toward his left. Jet stepped inside the first swipe and struck across the creature’s shoulder. The Vorpal Blade tore through hooked scales and opened flesh beneath, but the monster twisted violently instead of retreating. Its tail whipped around.

BANG!

Jet caught the impact on his forearm guard. Pain ran to his elbow, and the force knocked him sideways. The second predator attacked immediately. Jet planted his right foot, dropped beneath its jaws and drove the Vorpal Blade upward through the soft tissue behind its chin. Steel burst through the top of its skull. He ripped the weapon free, turned with the falling corpse and kicked the wounded predator squarely in the face before it could attack again.

Several meters away, Frey’s target charged like a living battering ram. Two Vritra Coils wrapped around its forward legs while a third closed around its tusked jaw. The monster dragged all three spectral restraints through the dirt, muscles bulging beneath leathery hide. Frey didn’t attempt to overpower it. He shifted the pull sideways, ruining its balance just as the giant bird lunged at him.

A spear intercepted the bird.

THUNK!

The weapon punched through one blue chitin ring and forced its neck aside. Its wielder, a broad-shouldered Walker from the western combat group, shouted, "Keep the six-legged bastard occupied! We’ll take this one!"

Frey answered by releasing the jaw Coil and sending it around the charging beast’s rear leg. Three restraints pulled in different directions.

CRACK!

The monster’s knee buckled.

Another Walker arrived with a Divine Rune glowing across both fists. The tattoo resembled the skull of a horned ram. Dense grey Mana gathered over his arms until each fist appeared wrapped in translucent stone. He stepped beside Frey and hammered both hands into the monster’s exposed ribs.

BOOOM!

The impact caved the ground beneath them.

The beast rolled onto its side. Frey was on it before it could recover, driving one curved blade through its eye while the stone-fisted Walker crushed the base of its skull with another strike.

Jet finished his wounded predator with a cut through the neck and immediately turned toward the bird. The spear wielder had been forced backward by a barrage of kicks, each strike leaving narrow cuts across his armor. Another woman attacked from the flank, her Divine Rune forming three floating disks of pale light around her wrists. She flicked two fingers.

One disk shot forward.

SHING!

It sliced across the bird’s thigh and curved through the air instead of disappearing. The monster stumbled, turning its long neck toward her. That exposed its back to Jet.

He sprinted forward, planted a boot against a protruding rock and jumped. The Vorpal Blade descended with both hands behind it.

SHRAK!

The bird’s neck separated halfway through. Jet landed, reversed his grip and completed the cut before the creature could thrash around. Its massive body collapsed heavily enough to shake the nearby grass.

There was no pause afterward.

The valley had become a continuous collision of monsters, Mana and steel. Adesewa’s crescent still held as a broad shape, bending wherever pressure concentrated. When one section killed its targets, those Walkers shifted to reinforce another. Nobody chased retreating monsters beyond formation, and nobody stopped for materializing Cores. The glowing spheres accumulated among corpses for later.

Jet and Frey fell into the same rhythm.

They joined four Walkers struggling against three plated lizards whose overlapping shells turned ordinary sword strikes aside. Frey used Vritra’s Coils to lift one creature’s front half from the ground, exposing its pale underside. Jet drove the Vorpal Blade into its chest while two others attacked the remaining lizards from opposite directions. Minutes later they reinforced the ranged team when winged predators descended toward the pool. Arrows crossed overhead. A woman with the wing-shaped Divine Rune thrust both palms upward, and compressed wind detonated among the diving monsters.

BOOM!

Two were thrown apart in midair.

Odhran’s arrows came from farther east, each shot precise despite the chaos. One pierced a falling creature’s throat before it reached the ground. The second struck another through the wing joint, sending it spiraling into the pool with an enormous splash.

Jet lost track of how many monsters he killed.

His world narrowed to distances, movement and openings. A claw passed his chest; he cut the limb. A horned beast charged; he moved aside and opened its flank. When a serpent with four muscular legs wrapped itself around another Walker’s shield, Jet severed the body behind its head. When two small predators tried surrounding Frey while he restrained something larger, Jet intercepted one and the stone-fisted Walker crushed the other.

The Raid Team was becoming bloodier with every minute.

Armor cracked and weapons chipped as the fighting continued. One spear snapped and was discarded. A burned Walker withdrew while another replaced him. The monsters paid more heavily. Corpses covered the western bank, blood stained the pool’s edge, and broken trees leaned over churned earth. The pristine valley was becoming a slaughter ground.

A roar sounded behind Jet.

He turned and saw a bulky feline monster pinning the woman who controlled the pale disks against a boulder. One disk was embedded in the creature’s shoulder, but its jaws were descending toward her face.

Jet ran.

Before he reached them, spectral chains burst from the earth.

CLANK!

They wrapped around the monster’s neck and forelegs. The chain-Rune Walker from earlier stood ten meters away with both hands clenched, his tattoo burning across his chest. "I can hold it for maybe three seconds! Someone kill the damn thing!"

Jet needed one.

He reached the monster, stepped onto the boulder and drove the Vorpal Blade through its temple. The creature sagged against the chains. The woman beneath it shoved the corpse aside, retrieved her floating disk with a trembling gesture and gave Jet a breathless nod.

"Thanks. I owe you."

Jet pulled his blade free. "Stay alive and repay me later."

He turned back toward Frey.

A massive impact shook the valley.

BOOOOM!

Jet lowered his center of gravity as soil jumped beneath his boots. For an instant he thought one of the Regal Coil Lions had escaped Adesewa, but the impact clearly came from the opposite side.

Frey appeared through drifting dust, one cheek streaked with blood that wasn’t his. "We’re past halfway. I counted roughly twenty-four ordinary Lessers still moving on our side, maybe fewer after that last collapse."

Jet scanned the battlefield. Frey was right. More than half of the original Lesser horde lay dead or dying, and the surviving monsters had begun spreading farther apart rather than throwing themselves blindly into the Raid Team. Several prowled near the water, unwilling to advance but equally unwilling to abandon the Palladium Tree.

Then another detonation thundered from the northern side.

BOOOOM!

This one was heavier.

Jet turned.

A cloud of earth rose beyond the shattered grass. Through it he saw Marcus braced behind his tower shield as something enormous hammered against him. Cassian moved along its flank, sword flashing. Safiya’s twin spears struck from the opposite side while Odhran fired from behind a broken tree. Bastian and the fifth member were engaged several meters away.

Around them moved five monsters.

Not ordinary Lessers.

The five peak Lesser-ranked monsters had finally entered the heart of the battle.