Aster Fall, Ch 6: Worthless Adventurers (Patreon)

“Damned adventurers,” Sam muttered, agreeing with Krana as he jumped off his horse and walked forward in front of the others. If the adventurers had planned better, they wouldn’t have made the monsters go crazy.

Now they’d made them his problem. The Storm Striders and all ten of the Flamecaller Devils were heading straight for them. They were only mildly injured and they were far more enraged than they had been before, which meant their attacks would be suicidal.

He gave his sister and mother a look as he passed them, a feeling of worry passing over him. This wasn’t how he’d wanted to have this fight.

They had a minute or two before they arrived, but not long. The monsters were fleeing straight down the road, since it was the clearest path, and they would arrive in a moment. Crystal flame began to spiral all around him as he prepared an Essence Shield to block them.

A flight of a dozen crystal flame arrows also formed, hanging in the air around him, but he was going to need something bigger than that. Those were just for anything that strayed.

His Aura of Crystal Flame and Flame Strike were both at the Expert tier, which let him create a significant amount of damage, but his Essence Shield was only at Advanced. He needed to boost that before the monsters arrived.

The Storm Striders and Flamecaller Devils looked crazy now. Even on a normal day, they would attack anything in their way. Now, he wasn’t sure what they would do. He couldn’t divert them to the sides, since that would just send them towards his family.

He either had to create a bubble to keep them all safe until the monsters passed or to try and kill them here. Killing them first was better.

A bubble probably wouldn’t work, since the monsters would stop and attack it. There was enough distance from the sun sphere that their natures would revert to bloodthirst. Then it would just turn into a battle to the death anyway.

There was one thing he could do to strengthen his shield, but he hadn’t practiced with it too much yet. Plans flickered like crystal lightning through his mind as he decided what to do.

He frowned as he extended his senses into his aura storage and sorted through what was available.

Of the auras he’d collected so far, including on the entire trip from Osera, he had six types. There was one Aura of Rebellious Flame, 12 Auras of Reclusive Tide, and 22 Auras of Shifting Shadow left over from the battle with the Bloodweaver. He had added 5 Auras of Thorny Pine, 4 Auras of Verdant Leaf, and 7 Auras of Frozen Lightning on the way home, from various monsters that had attacked them.

It was a good supply, and he’d been frugal in using them. All of them were fully charged to 20 essence.

After a moment, he pulled out one of the Auras of Frozen Lightning and held it between his hands. It was a swirling, misty sphere of blue-white light. Miniature bolts of electricity crackled across the surface and through the interior.

It came from a group of Thunderfreeze Bats that had attacked them in a mountain pass halfway to Osera. They were large monsters that hunted in packs, so he’d been able to identify the aura and claim several of them.

The Essence Shield in front of him was a construct of energy and he glanced down at the aura again before he raised it up. His hands slowly pressed into it, flowing into the interior as the lightning and ice crackled around his skin.

He hadn’t done this much before because it was wasteful of his auras, but this was the right time. He reached out to the newest ability he had, the one he’d gained after reaching Level 40.

Assume Aura.

The aura flowed into his hands and then through them, moving outward to pour all of its stored essence and energy into the shield’s structure. The Essence Shield was normally a geometric grid of interlocking hexagons that glowed with the translucent, cerulean light of his crystal flame.

As the Aura of Frozen Lightning flowed into it, a layer of ice began to spread across the surface, along with crackling bolts of electricity. The shield became lighter in color as the energies mixed, more of a white-blue, although it kept the darker blue in the center.

Assume Aura could be used in a couple of different ways, but this one let him pour the energy from an aura into his spells, charging them with unique attributes if he had enough time. It also gave him a way to use the essence he’d stored without having to combust it directly.

The other version of Assume Aura let him temporarily change his body into those attributes, but that was something he hadn’t touched yet. He didn’t like the idea of it, although it might be useful for something like Shifting Shadow if he needed to hide.

Behind his shield, Krana was raising earthen spikes into a low barrier wall that faced outwards. The spikes were jagged spears of stone that slanted outwards at a diagonal angle, pointing down the road.

Everyone else dismounted, handing her the reins to the horses so they could fight on foot. She staked the reins to the ground with more earthen spikes, so the horses wouldn’t run around when they saw the monsters.

She didn’t have as much control over Earth as Ayala had, but she was an Earth Seer and could manipulate it to an extent.

Aemilia and Altey stayed near her and a shimmer of mana covered both of them as they made sure their shielding abilities were active. Aemilia had a shielding spell as part of her Seer class and Altey had the amulet. Hopefully, they didn’t have to use them.

“What’s a Holy Sun sphere?” Aemilia asked as she pulled Altey closer to her. The girl had her fingers wrapped tightly around the new wand in her hand as she stared toward the monsters. They were just visible in the distance now as they raced closer.

Her expression was wide-eyed and determined at the same time. She’d never seen monsters charging at her before.

“It’s something the Church sells to adventurers,” Krana replied, her words choppy as she focused on extending the spike barrier and reinforcing it. “There’s Light magic inside it. Expensive, but useful. A good backup if you’re overwhelmed, since it scares monsters off. Weaker ones, at least. They don’t like Light for some reason. Maybe they were trying to break up the group with it, but they messed it up.”

Sam’s attention was focused on the approaching monsters. His blood began to hum, the stars of essence scattered through it resonating as his battle intent built. His face was hard as his hands rose into the air again, followed by an intensifying spiral of crystal blue light.

Between his hands, an Essence Blade began to form, the triangular blade of the spell compressing onto itself again and again as the edges hardened and began to shine like diamond. Twenty six points of essence flowed into it.

He had 88 essence total, and he was already down to 46. Nearly all of the energy for the Essence Shield had come from the aura, but he’d infused four points to create the basic structure.

He grabbed two of the Auras of Shifting Shadow and combusted them, taking him back to full.

The infused Essence Shield spread in front of the party in a semi-circular wall of electric blue ice. It was twenty four feet across, enough to cover the road and a bit more as it flowed back to either side.

Behind it, Krana’s spikes created a semi-circle and she was continuing to add more to make a full circle around the party. His father and Lesat had their weapons drawn and were waiting to either side, near the edge of Sam’s shield and inside the spikes, for any monsters that made it through.

As the monsters came closer, Sam stood at the front with the Essence Blade and the flight of crystal flame arrows flaring around him. Behind them, he could see the adventurers gathering together now and starting to chase the pack.

They were more than a half mile behind, however, and they weren’t going to arrive in time to do anything useful.

The idiots, Sam muttered to himself again.

This type of thing was why adventurers had a bad reputation. They caused chaos everywhere they went, broke things in town, intimidated the locals, and generally acted like criminals until they were caught by a military and pressed into forced service.

As the monsters closed the distance, he pushed a last bit of energy into Essence Blade and raised his hands. When they were a hundred yards away, he released it.

The spell cut through the Essence Shield with a rippling hiss of crackling energy as it shot forward, blurring through the air. It ripped up a trail of dust along the road as shearing winds blasted away from it.

There were nine Flamecaller Devils at the front, their mandibles clacking with flames and droplets of black saliva as their four lizard-like legs propelled them across the ground faster than a man could run.

Behind them, the two Storm Striders were following. Their gangly legs looked awkward, but it was an illusion. They had a drifting, ethereal quality to their movements. Their pace was smooth and remarkably fast as they glided forward, their shoulders rolling up and down. It looked like their limbs were rotating around their wasp-like waists.

Behind them, the last Flamecaller Devil followed, howling as it tried to keep up. Its balance was off from the missing arm, and it was stumbling here and there.

As Sam’s spell approached, the Storm Striders raised their hands in unison, combining their efforts. A whirling wind of fire and lightning sparks formed into a giant blade of spiraling winds in front of them. It was almost as wide as the road. It didn’t take them long.

Almost instantly, it shot forward over the heads of the devils. They were trying to block the Essence Blade before it reached the devils, like they’d done against the adventurers.

The two spells collided in a twisting hurricane of force thirty feet in front of the Flamecaller Devils. Winds whipped out in every direction, tearing at the road and the dirt.

Four of the devils were too close to it as they continued to run forward, and they were picked up by the blast and thrown off to the sides of the road.

A moment later, Essence Blade tore through the windstorm and continued into the ranks of the devils just behind that, where it exploded into an arc of crystal flame.

The explosion had been from the wind blade breaking around it. Its speed had slowed down a little, but the Storm Striders hadn’t been able to destroy Sam’s spell.

The next rank of Flamecallers Devils exploded apart, four of them splitting into chunks that went flying in every direction, and then the remaining energy of the Essence Blade washed over the others.

The crystalline flame slashed across the area as it scattered the remaining devils on the road. When it dissipated, six of them were still alive, as well as the two Striders, but their advance had slowed down.

Most of the devils were sliced or burnt in some way by the flames, but it was minor damage. The Striders were unharmed behind a swirling barrier of elements. Their fangs were bared in a snarl as they focused their attention on Sam, their claws rising to begin another spell.

The monsters were only twenty feet away now, and the Flamecaller Devils ripped up dirt from the road as they caught their balance and raced forward again.

Ripples of oily flames poured across their skin as they slammed into the Essence Shield with bone-cracking impacts that caused it to shudder. The flames around them spread forward, hissing against the ice and lightning coating the shield as it tried to corrode the barrier.

Here and there, the devils seemed to stick to the barrier, their bodies crackling with icy steam and lightning as their flames and the energy in the shield collided.

In one spot, a devil’s arm turned whitish, crackling with lightning before it exploded into chunks.

The shield had about twenty four points of essence in it to start, but it was dropping swiftly. The remaining six devils crashed into it one by one, their claws and mandibles tearing at it.

Their spit was corrosive as well, and the shield crackled with icy electric bursts as it destroyed the droplets.

An Earthen spear summoned by Krana shot up from the ground in front of the shield, piercing through the leg of one of the devils, but the devil ripped itself free and ignored the wound as it threw itself against the shield again.

Cracking thuds echoed along the length of the shield as Sam poured more essence into it, devoting his attention to defense even as he worked with half his attention to condense more crystal flame arrows around him.

Every hit on the shield was draining another point of essence, and his pool was quickly down to 60 again.

If it had just been the Flamecaller Devils, it wouldn’t have been a huge danger. They weren’t very smart and he could have just picked them off. But with a group of them and with the Storm Striders behind them, it was a different matter.

Jeric and Lesat were already running around the edge of the shield, their defensive spells flaring around them. They could see what was happening as well. They had to relieve some of the pressure on the shield, so Sam could switch back to offense.

If they let the Storm Striders build up a bigger spell, they could be in trouble.

The adventurers were about a half-mile away now and racing closer. Spells surrounded them, but Sam didn’t have time to watch what they were doing in detail.

His father was surrounded in a golden-red Earthen Shield as he slammed into one of the devils from the side, his hammers singing through the air. They were still the same weapons that Sam had made for him back in the Abyssinian Plains, but Sam had enhanced the enchantments a bit, adding another layer to make them stronger.

Golden stamina flared as Jeric used a Reverberating Blow, sending his hammer down with a wave of sonic force that crushed the skull of the devil in front of him. Claws scraped along his shield and mandibles snapped on his skin, but glanced off.

On the other side, Lesat hit the devil in front of him with an Enhanced Shield Charge, throwing it back from Sam’s barrier, and then he waded forward, his sword slicing out. The enchantments on his armor gleamed as he kept his back to the shield.

The Storm Striders had paused in place now, twenty feet away, and whistling winds were gathering around them as they worked together. Sparks in green, red, blue, white, and yellow began to spiral around them, creating a slowly growing disk. Tearing forces spun above it as the elements collided with each other.

A new wave of crystal flame arrows was forming around Sam, but he could only devote a bit of attention to them as he continued to brace the shield. He couldn’t afford to let anything through. Krana’s spikes were there, but they were just a backup.

His father and Lesat grabbed the attention of the devils a moment later and pushed them back from the shield a bit, which gave him a chance to turn his efforts toward the Storm Striders. The wave of crystal flame arrows shot towards them, releasing crackling sounds as they shot past the shield.

The elemental storm around the Storm Striders was already nearly forty feet wide and growing larger. It obscured the area all around him and their forms were already starting to blur away inside it, making it clear where they got their name.

Five elements were mixed together in their spell, turning it into a chaotic hurricane that flared with fire one moment and caused shards of ice to spray outward a moment later.

If there was any monster that was symbolic of the Storm Plains, it had to be these things.

They were immune to all but the most severe storms here. They used them to hunt, looking for travelers pinned down in them. They were one of the reasons no one should travel the plains alone.

The crystal flame arrows shot into the storm with a crackle of essence, tearing their own paths through the wind, but they disappeared as they flew toward the center. There were several explosions that echoed out with dull sounds, but he couldn’t tell if they’d hit the striders or not.

He frowned as he began to gather an Essence Blade in front of him, pouring his energy into it. By the time it was formed, his father and Lesat had finished off four of the devils and were pinning down the last two between them, leaving him a clear line of sight. There were another few broken Earth spears from where Krana had joined in on the battle.

He thought his mother had also attacked once or twice, but it was hard to tell. Her only attack spell was illusory.

A moment later, a crackling bolt of icy blue light shot past him, exploding against the inside of his shield. A point of essence flared away, and he glanced back to where his sister was holding the wand he’d given her.

His own spells were the only ones that could go through his shield, unless he deliberately opened them.

“Save that in case they get through!” he shouted as he gave her a nod of approval. It had cost him a point of essence to stabilize the shield, but that was fine. He was glad that she was learning to fight.

That was all he had time for, since the Essence Blade came together at that moment. He saw his mother pulling her back before he turned his attention to the Storm Striders.

Ahead of him, the storm began to shake, wisps of the energy burning away as flares of violet light and red streaks slashed through it. He frowned. The only thing that would cause that....

His father and Lesat were working on the last two devils as he released the Essence Blade. It tore through the air and blasted inward, burning away the winds that made up the storm as it headed toward the Storm Striders at the center.

He wasn’t sure exactly where they were, but it should be close enough.

A moment later, the spell exploded in the center of the storm with a roiling crackle of crystal flame that tore outwards, disrupting the other energies as it revealed the gangly forms of the striders.

The center of the storm turned blue-white as it became a giant conflagration. The elemental essence the monsters had summoned was reacting with the crystal flame that was burning at it.

The spell caused the storm to become unstable and the disk shape of it began to warp, turning oblong and thinning in areas as the energy in it collapsed.

A new flight of crystal flame arrows followed, heading for the revealed forms of the monsters as they were still trying to deal with the explosion.

At the same moment, arcs of twisting violet light flared through the storm from the other side, followed by arcing spheres of red flame.

Unfortunately, those spells missed the striders completely, soaring through the air as they headed for Sam’s shield.

Sam snarled as the rest of his essence poured out from him, infusing the barrier in front of him. In front of it, Jeric and Lesat saw the approaching spells and tried to dive to the sides.

They managed to get out of most of the blast range, but a couple of the violet arrows exploded against their barriers anyway as they flung themselves away. They hit the ground and rolled, putting some distance between them and the spells before they jumped back to their feet.

The rest of the ill-considered spells collided against Sam’s Essence Shield, shaking it in an explosion of violet steam and arcs of bubbling red flame.

The violet streaks seared Sam’s eyes as they impacted the shield, shattering into shards of light that disintegrated as ice lightning lashed back out at them. The red spheres stuck to the shield instead, burning away at it as their energies slowly faded, until they turned ice blue and cracked, exploding away with arcs of lightning.

Cracks tried to appear in his shield, but they sealed themselves over again a moment later as the essence he was pouring into it reinforced it.

The Striders in front of them were half-wounded, and rage boiled through Sam’s veins. The song that was always in his blood grew louder, intensifying.

Three auras flowed out of his storage and he combusted, the essence in them merging into his body as he snarled, his fangs flashing.

Crystal flame exploded upwards away from him in a gigantic pillar that roared into the sky. Crystal Focus flowed through every part of it as his mind locked onto the structure of the flames and condensed it, his will forcing it to his design.

The pillar condensed as it broke into three dozen crystal flame arrows, which ripped forward through the air, heading for the Storm Striders.

They were injured, and he wasn’t going to give them the time to recover. With their storm disrupted, he had to take advantage of the opening.

He’d deal with the adventurers after.

A moment later, the wave of arrows struck the Storm Striders, exploding through their bodies like streaking meteors.

Even so, they were durable. As the arrows struck them, they didn’t shatter to pieces. Their Constitution or innate abilities were too durable for that.

Their bodies spun to the left and right, and then back again, twisting like wild, spinning tops in the air as the arrows ripped through them, leaving holes behind. They were flung in one direction and then back in the other, their bodies slowly disintegrating as chunks were ripped away.

By the time all three dozen arrows had passed, there wasn’t much left.

Their tattered forms wavered in the breeze, their gangly limbs only half attached. Then, like a leaf drifting in the wind, they slowly collapsed to the ground.

All around them, the storm began to clear. The energy in it dissipated into the plains.

When it passed, it revealed a group of adventurers standing on the other side, their weapons raised. There were six of them, and their expressions were dark.

The Barbarian was at the front and as he saw them, his eyes widened. His face went pale for a moment and then turned red, his expression turning into a snarl as he yelled through the air.

“What the hell are you doing in the way, you damned scum?!” he roared, his words revealing that whatever was inside his skull, it was barely functioning.

“Are you trying to steal our monsters?! Hand over the corpses and get out here, or I’ll show you what happens to thieves!”

Sam stared back at him through the Essence Shield, his eyes narrowing into thin lines of disbelief.

Did this idiot think his group had killed all the monsters?

The adventurers had been stupid enough to attack the monsters from the start without planning, scared the monsters into running directly into a group of other travelers, chased them and then attacked without consideration of what was on the other side, and still dared to think they were in the right?

His father and Lesat moved in front of the shield, facing off against the adventurers. Their weapons were in their hands. Jeric’s face was much darker than that of the Barbarian.

He was also projecting a much more threatening aura, despite the five levels the Barbarian had on him.

Sam glanced back to where his mother and sister were still safe, standing behind his shield. They’d been directly in the line of attack from these adventurers. If the shield hadn’t been there....

“Stop there,” Jeric growled at the Barbarian. His voice was cutting ice that was growing colder by the word. “You send a wave of monsters at us, attack us...endanger my family, and now...now you want to come here and threaten us?”

The hammers in his hands hummed as his grip on them tightened, his muscles bulging. The fight had left him with a series of cuts down his arms and legs, and there was a scorched and mottled bruise across his left abdomen where a mandible had tried to take a bite out of him before it was deflected from his skin.

“Twist your head back on straight or I’ll do it for you!” Jeric roared, more furious than Sam had ever seen him before. Even Nelgen hadn’t made him this angry.

It was clear that he wasn’t going to give any ground.

The Essence Shield behind Jeric crackled with icy lightning and emphasized his words as Sam pushed a couple more points of essence into it, reinforcing it in case it was needed. At the same time, he pulled another two auras from his storage, combusting them as he stared across the twenty feet to the adventurers.

After what he’d just seen, he felt a burning desire in his blood to leave their corpses here on the plains.

No one would miss them.