Realm of Monsters - Chapter 683: Town Ablaze

Chapter 683: Town Ablaze

  “Wait, don’t go that way!” Tauri yelled, but it was too late.

  Stryg threw the door wide open and was met with a hundred archers aiming their arrows at the tavern’s entrance.

  He slammed the door closed and turned around. A dozen arrows riddled his clothes. Translucent scales of Yellow magic covered his skin. More than half the scales were cracked, some even broken.

  “Stryg!” Tauri rushed to him and looked him over frantically.

  “I’m fine. I think.” Stryg yanked out an arrow that was stuck between two scales in his shoulder. The arrowhead had managed to get through, but his flesh was tough enough that it only led to a scratch.

  “Had you been a second late with that protective spell, you’d be dead right now,” Freya whistled.

  “Next time, listen to me!” Tauri shook Stryg by his shoulders.

  He blinked. “Understood.”

  “At least your cloak seems relatively unharmed,” Freya pointed at the magical cloak they had taken from the mysterious assassins.

  “If only I had my back turned to them,” Stryg cracked a small grin.

  “This is no time for jokes. We need to find a way out of here,” Tauri said.

  “Gale still hasn’t given the signal,” Stryg said. “If we rush over to the docks, there is a good chance our targets will be destroyed in the midst of the fighting.”

  “And with all those soldiers outside, security will only be tighter near the docks,” Freya noted.

  Tauri put her hand on her chin, deep in thought. “…Unless we give them a reason not to.”

  “A distraction?” Freya guessed. 

  “It wouldn’t work, they have too many soldiers. They can easily spare men to deal with us and still guard their ships,” Stryg said.

  “Not to mention those three warships of theirs. If any of them turn their ballistas on the Dragon’s Hoard…” Freya snarled at the thought.

  “They won’t,” Tauri spoke with surprising conviction.

  “How?” Freya cocked her eyebrow.

  “The three of us possess Orange. If we can get out of here, I reckon it would be pretty easy to start several fires around town,” Tauri said.

  Freya smirked, “Lady Katag, are you suggesting we burn down the entire town? How very brutish.”

  “Oh, shut it, Goldelm.” Tauri rolled her eyes.

  “Wasn’t the plan to avoid any major conflict? Isn’t that why we did this whole pretend charade?” Freya remarked.

  “Stryg threw away our chance for that when he ripped the jaw off that orc captain,” Tauri said.

  “Still, this new tactic isn’t very honorable. I didn’t think you had it in you, Lady Katag~”

  “Would you rather fight the entire town instead? You know what he’ll do to them,” Tauri pointed an accusing finger at Stryg. “At least this way, the townsfolk have a chance to run away while their soldiers and mages try to put out the flames.”

  “Fair enough,” Freya shrugged. 

  “We just have to buy enough time for Gale’s signal, then we’ll rendezvous at the river that runs through town. That is, if Gale hasn’t already signaled us.” Tauri cast a suspicious look at Stryg.

  “I’m still not certain if what Holo told me about my abilities will work,” Stryg admitted. “But if it doesn’t, Gale will fire a bolt of lightning into the sky. It’ll be loud enough that I can easily hear it, even from town.”

  “And also garner the attention of every sailor in the docks,” Tauri noted.

  “Let’s hope the first signal works then,” Stryg grinned. 

  “Yeah,” Tauri sighed.

  “So how do we get out of here?” Freya asked.

  “I think I can take care of that,” Stryg offered. He raised his hand and engulfed the ceiling and all the impaled, mangled corpses in a torrent of flame.

  “Stryyyg, sweetie, we’re still in the building.” Tauri watched as the flames quickly ate up the wood and began to fill the tavern with smoke and the scent of burning flesh.

  “I know.” Stryg’s shadow darkened to an inky black and stretched out two hands that wrapped around Tauri and Freya’s waists. With a simple thought, he lifted them up by the shadows and brought them over his back, the shadows acting like a crude backpack.

  “Whatever you’re planning, do it quick,” Freya coughed and waved the smoke as best she could.

  “Please,” Tauri coughed in agreement.

  “On it.” Stryg channeled brown and yellow. His muscles swelled slightly as the might spell empowered his body, while the yellow scales regenerated themselves to pristine condition.

  He walked over to the bar counter, grabbed it by its base, and pulled. The wood groaned under the pressure as nails ripped off the planks. And with a final loud snap, the bar counter snapped off the ground. 

  “Holy shit, you’re strong,” Freya said, amazed.

  “You have no idea,” he grinned. “Cover your faces with your cloaks and hold on.”

  “Wait, what exactly are you—” Tauri’s voice was cut short as Stryg sprinted across the tavern and barreled through the back wall, using the bar counter as a battering ram. The counter tore apart as it ripped through wood and rock. And then suddenly, they were free, running through a back alley under the blue sky.

  Shouts resounded behind them, but Stryg kept running. With a twist of his heel, he turned around, his boots sliding across the ground, and hurled the bar counter. It slammed into the roof, caving it in, and letting the fires within erupt outwards in a billow of smoke and flames.

  Stryg shifted his feet and kept running, barely losing an ounce of momentum. After a few moments, they escaped the alley and ran into what amounted to their trade district, filled with shops and more taverns.

  Orcs walking down the street yelled and pointed at Stryg, still covered in blood from head to toe. Many of the orcs were calling guards.

  “Are you two okay?” Stryg reached behind, grabbed both Freya and Tauri’s shoulders, and cast a healing spell without stopping.

  “That was amazing!” Freya laughed excitedly.

  “It was impressive,” Tauri said reluctantly. She hated to admit when Stryg’s antics worked, for she knew encouraging her lover would only make him try more asinine ideas in the future.

  “Thanks,” Stryg grinned. “Now for the hard part.”

  “Hard part?” Freya asked.

  “Aiming,” he replied.

  “Oh no.” Tauri felt her stomach drop.

  Stryg pushed green mana into the ground. A pillar shot up under his feet and lifted him up until he was eye level with the roofs of the nearby houses. 

  “Don’t you dare,” Tauri warned with a glare.

  “Love you too,” he grinned and grabbed her by the shadow tendrils wrapped around. Stryg pulled his arm back and hurled Tauri across town.

  “You son of aaaaahhhh!” Tauri screamed through the air.

  Freya watched the scarlet woman disappear with wide eyes. “You know, on second thought, I don’t like this plan.”

  “If we’re split, we can start fires all over town,” Stryg assured her as he picked her up, aimed in the opposite direction he threw Tauri.

  “I’m good. I can fight right here just fine, trust me,” Freya sputtered.

  “You’re both Orange mages. Just use an agility spell to lighten your weight. You’ll land on a rooftop and be fine,” Stryg said.

  “That’s not how that works—!” Stryg tossed her through the air before she could finish her sentence. 

  “Now, I just have to hold on and wait for Gale’s signal.” Satisfied with a job well done, he looked below at the plaza and saw a retinue of guards quickly rushing towards. Stryg kicked the pillar underneath him with a surge of Green. He stayed atop the pillar as it toppled, only leaping off at the last moment to catch it with his bare hands. His knees buckled for a moment, but he managed to keep his grip. With a heavy growl, Stryg hoisted the pillar up onto his shoulder.

  Orange mana surged into his hands. Flames sparked off his fingertips and ran down the pillar, engulfing the entire stone in flames. The fire would quickly die out if he stopped channeling Orange, but he had plenty of mana to spare.

  The guards backed up in a panic. Their faces filled with shock at the impossible sight in front of them. Stryg grinned manically, raised the burning pillar like a club, and swung it. The guards barely had a chance to scream before they were cast into the heavens like rag dolls.

  People screamed. Stryg roared and smashed the pillar into a shop, flattening the building and sending flaming chunks of wood across the town.

~~~

  A sudden boom echoed over the town, reaching even as far as the docks. Callum poked his head out from one of the smaller ships. It was a wide, flat ship, with no deck below, but it could travel fast and hold ten or so people without problem. “What was that?” he asked.

  “Keep your head down!” Gale yanked him back out from view. Callum was not her ward, but he was a Veres, and she would be damned before seeing him come to harm. 

  The thundering steps of a hundred sailors running shook the wooden planks of the docks beside them. Slowly, Gale peeked her head up to see what the commotion was. Flaming debris was falling from the sky in the distance, crashing into the town in explosions of smoke and fire.

  It wasn’t the only fire, either. Two more large columns of smoke were rising from the east and west of town.

  “What is that?” Callum whispered next to her.

  “I said down!” Gale grabbed his head and pushed him out of sight. “Something went wrong. Our friends are creating a distraction.” 

  As if to confirm her suspicions, the three docked warships were beginning to cast off. It wouldn’t be long until their ballistas were aimed at the Dragon’s Hoard.

  Gale leaned over the edge of the boat. “Beatrix, how long does it take to check a damn boat?”

  Beatrix’s dark, wet hair rose from the water and her yellow eyes glared at the vampiress. “It’s not that simple. Each one of these ships has several different sigils engraved into its hull. Only certain ships have the right engravings to allow passage through Murkton. So, unless you want to abandon our plan to sneak into the city to go up in flames, let me finish my job!”

  “There’s no time. The Dragon’s Hoard will be the one to go up in flames if we don’t cast off now,” Gale said. “Get Nora and be ready to intercept our friends down the river near town.”

  “I thought Freya and the others were supposed to meet us on the ship?” Beatrix asked.

  “Change of plans. The warships are on the move. Tell Belle to slow them down as much as she can.”

  Beatrix nodded and dove underwater.

  Gale stared at her reflection in the water and spoke in a soft voice, barely above a whisper. “O son of the Navigator. Hear my plea; the warships are casting off, we need to move.” Her voice rippled through the waters with a strange silvery echo.

~~~

  “O son of the Navigator. Hear my plea.” 

  Stryg’s pointed floppy ear twitched as he heard Gale’s voice travel through the air. Even through the burning carnage around him, her voice rang clear. Holo had explained to him this part of the Navigator’s Aspect. To hear the cries of lost and drowning sailors at sea, begging for help.

  Holo had told him he possessed the ability after he had recounted his tale of hearing Loh out in the midst of a storm at sea during the Cairn’s attack on the Mora Manor. Stryg hadn’t been entirely sure if his sister was right, until now.

  “The warships are casting off, we need to move.”

  The plan hadn’t worked after all. It seemed the orc sailors cared more about destroying the Dragon’s Hoard than protecting the village. There was no time to lose. Stryg needed to act fast.

  He tossed the flaming pillar aside and focused his orange mana into an agility spell while holding on to his yellow protective scales and the strength of his brown magic. The three enhancement spells thrummed through his body. Where before the combined magic threatened to rip his muscles and bones apart, now he could feel his titan flesh straining, but holding together.

  With a loud snap, Stryg kicked off the ground and sprinted towards the docks with all the strength surging in his veins. The world blurred past him. The screams of the dying and the scent of burning wood faded away. And his target became clear.

~~~

  Belle swam in front of the warships, dipping in and out of the waters as she dodged arcane spells from the mages on deck. Each warship had at least a dozen mages, far more than Belle had originally accounted for. But it made no difference, her job was clear. She hurled bolts of lightning at the ships and their mage, before diving back into the water.

  Blue magic flowed around Belle, carrying her to the other side of one of the ships. She hurled another lightning bolt, but the warship’s red and brown arcane sigils flared to life, diffusing the lightning before it did any real damage.

  An enemy’s lightning bolt struck the water, staggering Belle and sending her back below the currents. Her aurum aegis had taken the brunt of the blow. Even without it, she’d have survived, though it would have stung more than she’d like to admit.

  Shifting tactics, Belle swam around and broke through the surface. The cold touch of chaos wrapped around her fingertips as she prepared to unleash solar flames on her enemies, when a blur shot across the docks like a whirlwind and launched itself straight into the hull of one of the warships.

  The warship rocked to its side from the impact. Belle stared in stunned surprise at the man-sized hole in the ship’s hull. Sailors screamed as the warship quickly took in water and began to sink.