Battlefield Reclaimer, Ch 51: Horned Water Lizards (Patreon)

The splintering sound of cracking stone exploded through the cavern as the wall blocking the tunnel shuddered under the impact of the Horned Water Lizards. Jeric turned to look at his son as he heard it, making sure that Sam was holding up alright. When he saw Sam’s confident expression, he only nodded and looked forward again, feeling a bit conflicted.

They were standing just inside the maze, close enough to the tunnel that they could sense what was on the other side. On the other side, there were a dozen Horned Water Lizards. He could see them clearly in the range of his Earth Sense, and as he watched, the three largest ones backed up and then ran forward again, lowering their heads.

The monsters were twelve feet long from their heads to the tips of their tails, with powerful limbs corded with muscle. They were low to the ground, only about three feet tall at the most, and covered in crescent-shaped, blue-grey scales that overlapped in rippling patterns like waves.

Their eyes were intense, aquamarine gems that glinted like seaspray in the sun, remnants of an ocean that was very foreign to these caves. Among other things, it marked their Outsider origin, even if they were only regular monsters now.

Their foreheads were tipped with three long crystal horns, with one behind the other two to create a triangle. The horns curled backwards slightly and their texture resembled the notched lines on a seashell. They were also surrounded by a constant flow of water that surged along them, glowing the same color as the lizards’ eyes.

As the monsters charged toward the wall again, that water surrounding their horns rose up into thick spikes that extended their reach by a foot and added the crushing force of the tide to their attack.

The lizards could smell the people on the other side, and they were hungry. They’d been running for days now to get away from the thing that was coming, but it was a little way behind them now. They had enough time to dig out the food that was hiding here.

Jeric shook his head as he thought about what had brought them to this point. The earlier battles had all happened so quickly that there had barely been any time to think about them, but this one was different. Waiting behind a wall as monsters tried to break in was making it difficult not to think about his choices in life.

He had never wanted to bring Sam into all of this or have him risk his life fighting monsters. Even now, he just wanted them to get home and live a simple life, using their new classes to make a place for themselves. The Guardian Star on Sam’s hand had changed all of that though, as much as he didn’t like it.

The lizards attacking the wall made it clear they were going to have to fight here, whether he liked it or not. There would be even more of it in the future, if the Guardian’s words were true, ...and the flaw with the spiders had shown that they were.

He’d never seen anything like that before. It was some type of gash torn through the world and it made him question what he knew. He’d lived a full life, but there were still a lot of things in the world that he hadn’t experienced yet. It wasn’t difficult to reach 200 years of age or even more if you Evolved enough and managed to survive the battles it took to get there.

He’d heard of Outsiders before, like everyone else, since they were a common part of myths, and he’d known that the old ruins were probably from them, but it had all been distant back then, like a story. It was just something to think about while exploring.

Finding out that it was all true and that Outsider invasions were much more common than he’d thought had left him shaken and then determined to set things right. There was more to the world than he’d thought, which meant he needed to get strong enough to see his family through it.

He shook his head again as he focused on the present, looking back towards Sam. His son was growing up. Ever since the battle at the gnome village, Sam had been changing by the day, becoming more confident and sure of himself. It was good to see, but strange.

When his son was younger, he’d been an easy-going lad, cheerful and a bit chaotic. Now, he was becoming someone else..., a man more sure of himself as he gained the power to carry out his goals. The crystal blue flames swirling around him proved that. His eyes were burning with the same color, giving him an otherworldly cast that highlighted his calm expression as he looked toward the wall.

Sam had found his stride down here in the tunnels, fighting against the things that wanted to eat them. Despite that, there was a lot that Jeric blamed himself for. The current situation was only part of it. He’d wanted a simple life for his family, not this chain of battles and a mission to repair the world.

At least it didn’t seem to be bothering Sam....

And they‘d found some good people, he told himself, as he looked towards Ayala and Krana, who were standing nearby with the two guards. The young Mage and the dwarven Seer were powerful in their own right, and their backgrounds even more so.

It had been a rocky start with that hired wizard attacking Sam..., but it seemed like it was going to work out. Jeric’s expression hardened as he looked toward the wall again, reaching for the hammers at his belt.

Soon, the lizards would break through the wall and enter the maze. Hopefully, that would divide them up as they rushed through it. When they got to this side, he’d take them down as they came. Sam might have gotten a job to protect the world, but his job was to protect Sam.

His knuckles cracked as he gripped the haft of his weapons and then released them again, waiting until the time was right. His face firmed as he pushed his wishes to the back of his mind and focused on the present.

No monsters would be getting past him.

---

Sam was studying the lizards on the other side of the wall as his crystal flame reflected off the surface of the stone. He could see the monsters clearly with Crystal Focus, which flowed through the wall in front of him. In many ways, it was better than seeing them with his eyes, since it let him analyze their energy.

He was pretty sure that these lizards would have auras and he was looking forward to collecting them. It was something to do with Water, which made him wonder if he could turn their horns into water crystals or something similar. The element radiated through their presence, just like the fire that had been a part of the salamanders and spiders.

Once these were dealt with, he needed to reclaim their auras and intensify them, stocking up as many as possible for whatever bigger thing was following them. Krana was keeping an eye on that, but it was still a couple of days away.

He looked over to his father and saw the fierce expression as he glared at the wall, so he sent him a grin. It looked like his dad wanted to fight these things too. A random thought passed through his mind as he wondered if these water lizards tasted the same as salamanders.

As he looked around and saw the nervous expressions on the guards and the tight focus on Ayala’s face, he could tell that not everyone was as excited for this battle as he was. It was strange to think back to a few weeks before, when he would have agreed with them.

Now, things were different. He wasn’t sure if it came from his expanding abilities or absorbing the essence from the spiders, but he liked this feeling of expectation before battle. Perhaps this was who he had always been, and he just hadn’t had the ability to let it out before.

Risk came with living, and all he could do was face it straight on and find out who was stronger. He flexed his hands and felt his talons cut the air as a surge of expectation ran through him. It was better to see the world as a source of challenges and power, rather than as something to avoid.

Ahead of him, the Horned Water Lizards rammed into the wall again and this time it gave way with a sharp crack that echoed through the air as the monsters’ horns pierced through the stone. A giant crack ran from top to bottom as the barrier started to fall.

A moment later, they struck it again, sending rubble flying as the first of them tried to shoulder through the gap. Behind it, others hit it as well, their horns breaking apart the remaining pieces of the wall. As they got stuck in the rubble, their claws flew, throwing rocks to the sides as they dug their way through.

There were three exits to the maze and their group moved to their stations that blocked them, taking up a defensive posture in the killing area where the lizards would exit. Sam had one exit, his father had the second, and Krana had the last with the two guards next to her.

Behind the three groups, Ayala waited, ready to raise another wall or to heal as needed. She was the reserve force in this fight.

Sam looked toward his gap as he tracked the first lizard that had entered the maze. It tumbled over the rubble in the wall as it shook the stones off and climbed back to its feet, its scaled legs clawing at the ground. Then it started to run forward, darting smoothly around the walls in its way as it smelled the humans on the other side.

There was no sense of essence from the monsters, but he didn’t expect there to be. It only came from Outsiders that had just arrived through a flaw. The World Law had converted it into experience for these lizards.

A long, whistling hissss echoed through the maze, rattling from the walls, as the first lizard raced through it, darting through one opening and then the next as it followed its nose. Chance directed it toward Sam’s exit. A smile stretched across his face as he followed its path and waited.

A moment later, it charged through the gap, its head swiveling from side to side as it clawed at the stone. It was a giant lizard, one of the three leaders that had broken through the wall. Its scales gleamed blue-grey in his eyes. He could see the flow of the same energy throughout its body, like a river of light that marked out its aura.

He saw it not just with his eyes, but with his senses as he touched the aura around it, feeling the force of the ocean. The lizard’s energy was a violent, storm-tossed sea, and it was somehow living in these caves where it didn’t belong.

As soon as the lizard moved out of the maze, two crystal flame arrows ripped through the air toward it. A shimmering barrier glowed around its horns and tried to sweep forward to block the attack, but it was no use. The first arrow shattered the shield and continued onward, joined a moment later by the second that was completely unimpeded.

One after the other, the arrows exploded through the lizard’s head and neck. It didn’t even have time to realize what happened before it tumbled to the side. Its momentum carried it a dozen feet until it fell over and the last of its life fled.

Sam glanced toward it, tempted to go and gather the aura, but there were more lizards already entering the maze. He looked toward his father and Krana to make sure they were alright, but no other lizard had reached them yet.

He turned his attention back to the front, waiting for the next enemy to appear. Three more lizards were already charging through the maze, followed by another four. The maze did its job in dividing them up as the impatient monsters took different openings, competing with each other to see who could reach the humans first. Ayala was standing by to change the internal structure of the maze if needed, but it wasn’t required yet.

This time, lizards charged through all three of the openings, splitting off toward the others as well. His father’s hammers were already humming in the air as his yellow-gold shield surrounded him.

Near Krana, the guards were testing their own barriers that he’d just enchanted. Bright yellow shields appeared and disappeared in front of their shields and in spheres around their bodies. It looked like the enchantments were working.

Jeric rushed forward as the next lizard leapt out at him, meeting it head-on. It had thought it would find weak prey cowering in a hole, and it tried to rear backward as it saw the human growing larger in its vision. Before it could escape, his hammers were already swinging down, slamming into its skull with a staccato beat.

The lizard was born of the sea, whether it was from a recent ancestor or some distant primal origin in another world, but it had lived its entire life in a cave. In that moment, it realized why the tide always broke on the shore. Its skull splintered under the blows as the hammers sang its death.

On her side, Krana rushed forward with the two guards right behind her. Her eyes were intense as she dodged the lizard’s tail, stepping forward an instant before it swung through the area where she had been.

Her next steps were hard to understand as she dodged right and left again, moving in a pattern that only she could see, but the lizard spun with her, its claws shining as it tried to catch what it thought was dinner. Every time it attacked, she was in a different place, until her war hammer slammed down through its skull, closing its eyes permanently.

The next lizard popped through the exit in front of Sam, but it froze as it saw the corpse of the previous lizard. Instead of retreating, it reared up as the horns on its skull began to shine. The water rippling between them intensified, forming into a crystalline spike that shot toward Sam. It spun through the air like a drill, rotating as it flew.

Halfway there, it shattered against a cerulean barrier of crystal flame. Before the lizard could see what was happening, two arrows of the same flame pierced through the exploding technique and blew its head apart.

As it fell over and blocked the exit, Sam frowned at it, debating how he was supposed to unclog the maze. A moment later, Ayala waved her hand and the ground beneath the lizard surged like a wave, shifting the lizard off to the side and dumping it there.

Excellent, he thought, as his attention turned to the remaining lizards that were entering through the maze. Four had already died, including all three of the larger ones, and now there were only eight left.

It didn’t take long to finish off the rest of them. As soon as the monsters ran out of the exits, they died. These lizards were a lower level than all of them now, and they wouldn’t have been difficult opponents even before that.

They were vastly outmatched by the team. On top of that, the maze had worked even better than they’d hoped, sending the lizards to them one by one, which tilted the battle in their favor. Even though he knew it was only a warm-up to what was coming, Sam felt pleased as he looked around the battlefield.

His father, for some reason, looked more conflicted, despite the steadiness in his movements as he put away his hammers. Sam studied him for a moment, trying to figure out why. He was probably just worried about what was coming next.

The guards were wiping sweat from their faces as they sheathed their swords. The barriers had done their job, blocking the one water spike that the lizards sent in their direction.

Behind them, Ayala looked around the area before she sat down where she was, her expression unruffled as she began to meditate. She hadn’t needed to heal anyone, but she had used some mana redirecting the lizards and moving the corpses out of the way.

Sam had to wonder if her calmness came from accepting the life that had been designed for her or if she just didn’t care anymore. His confidence came from excitement, but hers was almost apathetic, as if nothing touched her now. He studied her with a frown, wondering if everything was alright.

She had done everything asked of her, but she hadn’t made any suggestions in the past day or so. The way she was acting..., it was almost like someone who had already accepted her death. Or at least someone who had given up her dreams in the face of reality and realized that adding more struggle was futile.

He didn’t know what exactly had passed through her mind when she saw the flaw, but he knew it had shocked her and made her reevaluate all of her decisions. He wanted to go and talk to her, but he wasn’t sure it would help. He was living proof of her realization that the world was under threat.

Still, he couldn’t quite let it go. Maybe he could help her see the world in a better light. There were families to keep safe, and crafting to do, and.... His thoughts were interrupted by Krana’s warning.

“We have about an hour and a half,” the Seer announced, her eyes silver as she searched the distance again. “Then the Grey Shard Stalkers and Seekers will be here. There are six Stalkers and two Seekers. The maze should still work, but it will be more difficult. Let’s collect the experience and clean this up, and then rest while we have the chance.”

Sam didn’t need any more encouragement to move forward to the lizards that he’d killed. He was already itching to collect the auras. He could talk to Ayala right after.

There were three of the lizards piled in front of him and their scales reflected the light of his flames in rippling sea shades as he leaned down to touch them. The experience was first and he felt the surge of energy as he pulled two of the twisted silver threads into himself.

The energy  bubbled through his blood and fizzed in his mind, boosting his already decent mood. The lizards were all level 20 or higher, with the biggest at 25.

Congratulations, Scion. You have used your Class abilities to slay your enemies.

You gain 79,350 Class experience.

Class Experience: 490,990 / 533,000

General Experience: 495,880 / 533,000

It wasn’t enough to gain a level, but it was close. 

There were six of them and twelve lizards, so to be fair, he saved the third lizard for Ayala. He could take it over to her in a minute. Then he searched for the aura, resting his hand on top of the biggest lizard’s scales as he found it.

It came to his mind with the rush of the ocean, the thundering sound of water crashing against the shore and the susurration of the waves. It was endless, rippling blue, filled with a weight that crushed everything beneath it.

Below that, there was sand and silt, where eggs could be laid far from prying eyes, safe and cold beneath the waves. It was waves and the ocean’s roar, crushing force and secrets, and the prompt sprang into his mind as it pulled his attention away from the feeling of it.

You have encountered an unknown aura.

Do you wish to Reclaim it (28% chance) or to Identify it?

Since there were twelve of them, he chose to identify it, and then the one after that as well, as the taste of silt filled his mouth as the auras burned away to nothing, consumed one after the other by the process of identification. The first one raised his chance to 50% and the second was enough to completely identify it.

You have Identified an Aura.

Aura of Reclusive Tide.

He nodded as he turned to the third one and felt for it, noting that he had a 68% chance to reclaim the aura now as he pulled it toward himself. The aura separated from the lizard, forming into a bright blue sphere that rippled like water as it flickered past his shoulder and into his storage.

A success.

The other lizards weren’t far away and as he moved toward them, he exchanged a few words with his father and Krana. The Seer’s eyes widened as she watched what he was doing.

“I’ll explain more about my class later,” he said, as he looked toward her. 

He had to trust her at some point and this was one detail of his class that was too easy to see. She was smart and could put together the spheres that were forming from the corpses with the one he’d used to enchant his amulet.

Of the remaining lizards, he managed to get seven more auras, which was better than his percentage chance. It brought him up to 11 total. He would have to spend some time charging a few before the next wave arrived. It would be a waste to combust them otherwise.

He looked over toward Ayala as he returned to the lizard he had saved for her. He picked it up by the tail and one leg, dragging the four hundred or so pounds without too much difficulty as he walked toward her.