Chapter: 486 Bonus - Cazor, Xeel, Meallain, Holly (Patreon)

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Cazor cursed as he drilled through yet another wind-blade starling with a spike of iron, its shape held firm and its faster-than-arrow flight fully under his power and control with meticulously created and guided magnetic fields.

A spray of iron dust broke apart three of the five incoming attacks near him, the other two bisecting caravan guards off to his right.

He cursed again.

He wasn’t even supposed to be in this caravan, let alone defending it. He was a passenger, by starlight.

He was also the only reason any part of this caravan was still alive.

A great-flock of starlings had seemingly been migrating outside their expected cycle, and fast enough that the drivers’ sensory methods didn’t work as advanced warning. Given that, combined with the fact that this caravan had been near enough to the path for the arcanous creatures to easily sense, it was no wonder that they’d diverged and attacked.

The oxen, horses, and more than half the guards had died before Cazor had realized what was happening. Three of the four Mage Protectors had fallen before Cazor had burst from his wagon and begun slinging his power about.

The fallen guards’ weaponry had been put to great use in thinning out the flock as he turned the blades into emulsifying whirlwinds of death.

Even so, his magics were not suited to this type of work, and there were still thousands of the avians in the murmuration.

The only guards still effectively fighting were those with lingering defensive bubbles of air, generated before the Air Mage Protector had been targeted by the flock and torn to shreds. Well, those and the three near Cazor himself.

The little birds were attacking the wagons themselves, which were resilient enough, but they wouldn’t stand up for much longer. That was… not good, because when those broke, the resulting dimensional detonation would kill everyone inside. He did not want that to happen. However, if he evacuated the wagons, the birds would kill the former occupants just as thoroughly, if a bit more painfully.

With a growl, Cazor dumped his entire stock of iron, quickly using magnetism to plate the main passenger wagon as best as he could.

The Dimensional Mage was a talented one, and he’d been able to get all of the passengers into a singular wagon, save one. Cazor had had his own wagon, but he wouldn’t devote any energy to defending that. The cooks had abandoned the chuck wagon already as well, but they’d died before reaching the passenger wagon, also before Cazor had come to the caravan’s aid.

The guardwagon was empty because every guard had come out to help with the defense.

Cazor had been able to shield the servant he’d been granted as the man fled to the passenger wagon after Cazor had stepped out.

The air shields burst in quick succession and those guards who had been staying in the fight by sheltering within fell, too far away for Cazor to protect.

The three beside him drew in closer just as a tidal-wave of razor-sharp wind-blades crashed down on them.

Cazor did his best, but he’d simply devoted too much iron to the protection of the wagon to effectively defend those still outside. It was a rookie mistake, but then, he was a rookie in this circumstance; he’d never had to participate in defending a caravan before.

He took four vicious cuts, and the three guards fell, utterly minced.

Only those in the wagon remained.

Just keep them alive.

Two hundred people or near enough that it made no difference.

It was an unusually large passenger load to a waning city, but not overly so. Apparently, due to several lost caravans on this route, the Caravan Guild had tried to concentrate their passengers that would have been in a few trips into one, for greater safety.

They just had to hold out until the backup he’d called for could arrive. The fastest rapid responder was otherwise engaged, so they had at least ten more minutes before a local, high-level Archon could get there to help.

That was fast, all things considered. It just might not be fast enough for them.

They just had to hold out…

That’s not working out too well.

There was an almost constant stream of the little birds circling faster than would be possible for mundane avians, but they managed with generous applications of wind-based magic.

Each one was faster than an arrow, and even without their magical blades, their bodies hit like stones from a siege engine.

The latter description was all too apt as the starlings began hurling themselves against the iron on the wagon.

Cazor didn’t have iron plates; all he had was iron dust held reasonably tight and in place with magnetism.

It didn’t stand up well to high-impulse hits.

Even as he chunked another flight of the rusting birds, the sound of splintering wood caused him to whirl back to the wagon.

A wave of nearly a hundred starlings in a conical formation were in process of slamming into the passenger wagon, each hit driving the iron dust away from the center of the shape in an expanding circle.

Another flight right on the heels of the first hit the wagon itself, adding to the damage until—

TING.

It was a simple sound, like the dropping of a nail onto a steel plate.

To Cazor’s magesight, there was an odd relaxing of power around the wagon.

An instant later, WHOOMP.

Splinters of wood and bone, accompanied by water, blood, and other fluids, soft cloth and fleshy bits intermixed with bread, cheese, and the remains of everything else—identifiable or not—expanded outward like an expanding bubble, pushing his iron ahead of it.

He reacted as quickly as he could, pulling all his iron toward him, forming a bubble around himself and thickening it with every passing instant.

Even so, he was knocked aside when the wave hit.

He staggered but remained on his feet.

Then, the starlings only had him to target.

Unfortunately for them, he now had a nearly two foot thick shell of iron dust around himself.

As each bird hit, he rolled the iron over it, crushing the body before letting it fall to the ground so that it wouldn’t weaken the integrity of his defense.

Even so, it took nearly another five minutes before the attacks slowed and finally stopped.

Five more minutes passed after even that before he lowered his defenses, shunting his iron back into his dimensional storage in a swirling vortex.

The carnage around him was… exactly as one would expect, given what had happened.

He grimaced, then sighed, pulling out his Archive slate.

It was a simple report: Another caravan lost. Reinforcements no longer required.

He included some specifics, but he’d give a more detailed report later. If his information was correct, this was the twentieth caravan to be lost in the last year, just in the region around Bandfast and Alefast, Waning.

For his own sanity, he had never investigated the stats for those around the new Alefast. Things were always more dangerous around new cities.

Cazor shook his head at his own silliness, pulled out enough iron to pack his wounds and keep them from worsening before forming a disc.

So much for taking my time to enjoy the scenery…

He took off at a reasonable pace—he was in no position for another fight at the moment—and made straight for Alefast, Waning. If he made good time, he’d still arrive enough before the wedding to get healed and rest.

It would be nice to see something so joyful after so much death.

  *

Xeel flashed across the battlefield before he forcibly transformed his light-body into flesh once more, imposing natural magics around it yet again.

This fight had gone back and forth for far, far too long, extending the damage done to the city so close at hand. Hopefully, this repositioning would allow him to turn the tide.

He was very fast at the process, but it still took nearly a second to bring his magics into being once again. As such, he only barely got his shield of hardened light up in time to deflect the pin-point stream of water. Even then, he only got the defense in place in time because it literally moved at the speed of light.

The deflected line of water cut a thin furrow into the ground below, nearly ten feet deep through the rock, soil, and occasional body.

Even so, he was hardly purely on the defensive. At the same time, he counterattacked.

He had aimed precisely, and his lance refracted perfectly off the fish-scaled arcane’s water shield to hit his—

Xeel cursed.

The woman had variegated the inside surface of her defense, both defusing the light and sending it vaguely away from herself.

He was becoming too well known as a defender of humanity, and they were coming prepared for his usual methods.

That was fine. He had a few more up his sleeves.

Even so, he likely couldn’t continue as the rapid responder for defense for gated-humanity for more than another decade or so.

He would have to cycle out for a bit, fall back and take up a more supporting role.

He hated those periods…

Regardless, in the next moment, he struck out with a massive column of light. This time it wasn’t as directed or concentrated. Instead, it was entirely in the infrared spectrum.

It was effectively pure heat-energy.

The woman’s eyes widened as her defenses boiled away only a moment before her very scales sizzled, the flesh underneath baking.

He followed up with another lance of light that took her straight through the heart, searing a clean hole all the way through her body, bones, organ, and all.

It struck true, and she tumbled from the sky.

Not dead.

He pursued, but she managed to maneuver herself through the wreckage below—using some artifact or other to heal herself—and slip from his line of sight, disguising herself from his senses and seemingly retreating toward the south before she ran too low on power.

Xeel sighed again, turning to take in the devastation wrought upon the land below. 

The entire south and eastern quarters of Surehaven’s mining and farming districts were obliterated.

They looked as if a tsunami had hit them, and that is essentially what had happened.

That woman had done the bulk of the damage in her opening attack, having somehow brought a large-lakes worth of salt water along with her. So even with Xeel arriving less than a minute after she did, there was nothing that he could do for those already slain.

Even with the enemy driven off, Xeel’s work wasn’t done. There would be miners in those flooded tunnels. Some would be alive still, but more would be bodies in need of recovery so that their families could mourn properly.

Additionally, the salt that had been in the water would have to be dealt with before the farms were viable again as well.

He expanded his senses, searching for the survivors and bodies alike. This would not be quick.

He glanced to the south-east for a moment, then he used his Archive connection to send a message.

He retracted his promise of attendance to Mistress Tala and Master Rane’s wedding.

They would understand, and there simply was too much to do.

Across the human cities, four calls for aid had come in over the hour or so that he’d fought the arcane, and only three had been successfully answered before complete disaster came to pass.

This had been a hard day for gated-humanity. Not the worst one in the last decade, but definitely the worst in the last year or so.

His senses and focus returned to the devastation.

We need to remind them there are consequences for such rogue actors. Maybe it really was time for a warning strike on the arcanes…

But he could think on that later. Now, he needed to focus on Surehaven.

There were no survivors on the surface, and most of the cleanup would be handled by others. Despite that, he knew that he could get to the few who were still alive that he sensed underground, fast enough to make a difference.

Let’s see if we can keep the death count from ticking any higher today, shall we?

  *

Meallain cleaned the human blood off her protian blade before the ancient steel could be further tainted.

The Leshkin forest wasn’t precisely safe for arcanes, but it was safer for them than for humans, especially with Meallain hunting their research centers.

She wanted to understand.

Tali had come from these people. Young Be had traveled among them, and her master, Pillar Cruas, had finally authorized her to make this exploratory probe of gated-humanity.

She would do it right and proper.

She would follow procedure, unlike little Be.

It had taken far longer than ideal, but she was finally here.

She needed to understand.

This small, heavily defended, and magically hidden settlement hadn’t been as easy of a fight as she’d thought, and she was getting dangerously low on power.

Thankfully, her authorization wasn’t a one-mission probe. That meant that she could take her time. That meant that she could be smart about how she approached it.

She could be thorough.

No individual in this compound—or any other she’d raided so far—had been her equal, but they’d managed to delay her long enough for all their Archive devices to be slagged.

Meallain ground her teeth before turning and kicking one of the bodies beside her, hurtling it across the clearing to bounce, wetly, off a massive trunk.

“Why won’t you just give me the answers I want!?”

They hadn’t been willing to talk to her. She’d breached their defenses with ease, but they’d thrown themselves at her with abandon regardless. They’d been especially fierce after they realized she’d locked them out of their precious Archive… she just hadn’t realized they’d respond by destroying the very devices she’d been temporarily disabling with her aura.

Despite their vicious attacks on her person, she’d tried to take prisoners, but they’d been uncooperative.

Next time.

She needed to understand these people. For some reason, Be had been obsessed with them, and they were those from which her Tali had come.

Meallain turned toward the next gathering of gated-humans that she could sense in the middle distance but hesitated.

She was weak, comparatively almost out of power.

If the next enclave was as well defended as this had been, she wouldn’t be assured of victory.

She couldn’t go back to Platoiri to refill. She wasn’t welcome in that city, despite the House of Blood’s continued place of honor among the Major Houses in residence there.

The plains?

There were cities with humans and arcanes living together there.

Yes. I can learn some from them while refilling my reserves.

It was a plan, then.

She turned and left the bodies for the forest to reclaim.

Nothing they possessed was of interest to her. Even taking their lives had gained her nothing.

Stupid, frustrating humanity. I will learn what I want to know, or I will end you all.

As she moved through the trees, avoiding the occasional Leshkin, she admitted something to herself.

I just might do both.

  *

Holly grumbled as she swatted another charging lightning cervid to the ground.

More accurately, she adjusted its proprioception and vision to make it slam itself down.

Its head hit, the antlers discharging harmlessly into the ground even as it slid forward.

This one’s lowest horns caught on the ground, causing it to flip up, snapping its neck before it tumbled into a physiologically impossible heap.

It had been going rather fast.

There had only been a half dozen of the beasts, and this was the last, but they’d still been annoying to deal with.

Well, they’d been distracting to deal with.

Less distracting than leaving them alone, though.

The sacrifices I make.

She turned her eyes back to her book, even as the Mage Protectors thanked her for her assistance in the same breath that they asked her not to do so again.

They apparently had things well in hand.

Holly waved them away. “The irregular sparking was annoying to listen to.”

They didn’t really seem to have a good response to that. After standing beside her silently for a moment, they moved away.

They were right that they could have dealt with the stags. Their inscriptions weren’t her work, but they weren’t half bad.

Not really half good either, but serviceable enough.

She lifted the book back up, reading with half her mind, while the other half pored over her work.

She hated to leave her workshop, but the girl was getting married.

That was an event worth her time, especially since the girl was already immortal.

I do miss you sometimes, Thoth… But, he’d been gone a long time. The old ache would likely never fully fade.

She still felt the twinges from her soul, from the connection that had been forged so long ago and then—

No, I’m not going to get sentimental now.

Their caravan had been attacked at least mildly every day as they moved through the mountains toward the pass down to Alefast, Waning.

Those attacks were getting worse as they approached the waning city, but they weren’t anything that a standard Protector contingent shouldn’t be able to handle.

No excitement for me, then…

She’d not flexed her fighting prowess in centuries at this point, and she was a bit afraid that she was getting rusty.

Oh, she kept up her practice in the War Games array, but it wasn’t the same.

That was a very clever invention, allowing those of high advancement to really let loose, without exposing their magics to others directly or creating such a scene that they were detectable at a great distance.

It was likely one of the key advancements toward stopping the assassinations of highly advanced, gated-humans that had been so troublesome a few hundred years earlier.

Such humans were now harder to find, and any potential assassin had a harder time learning what they’d face when they attacked.

All in all, the War Games were useful, but Holly missed the feel of winning a real battle.

These deer? Like swatting flies.

Master Xeel’s been requesting relief at some point in the next couple centuries, which means he’s probably been in desperate need of such for at least a decade already. Maybe…

But that would require leaving her work, and she couldn’t have that.

She felt like she was on the cusp of another breakthrough.

Just another couple of centuries more and she could radically improve the science of inscriptions yet again.

Ahh, the burden of being too useful.

Still, it was good to get out of Bandfast for a change. She hadn’t really left since the city had been founded, and that was likely a failing on her part.

This wedding will be good for everyone, it seems.

Moreover, she was excited to present her gift and to see the results.

If she were being honest, that was what had drawn her out of her work.

Yes, it would be interesting indeed.

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