"You were right; their Mages retreated," Uhren observed from beside Minerva as they stood up by the Nivari, watching the battle from the vantage point.
"They wouldn't want to hurt their own troops," Minerva shrugged as she continued forward, a calmness radiating from her face as bloodlust raged beneath the surface. "It's one of their weaknesses. Because of it, their troops won't be getting any shields when we start firing back," she added, pausing to look over at him before continuing. "Once the first of ours break through their line and we know where the civilians are, blow the horn. The Nivari will rain fire on the line of carriages to open up a route. As soon as that happens, I want you and the other ten through it. Move quick, grab the girl, and come back to us. The Nivari and our disposable troops will cover your escape."
Uhren nodded at her as a volley of magic began streaming over their heads toward the guards.
"I'll be joining the battle; need to keep that damn Minotaur from culling any more of our forces. Sound the retreat when you acquire the N'moran. And Uhren, do not fail me."
With a nod, Minerva watched him disappear to the left, the side of the battle that was closest to the river. Turning her eyes to the bloody skirmish before her, she smirked as a feeling of ecstasy began pumping through her veins, ready to let loose for the first time in months.
"Now, where the hell are yo-"
"End them all!" a deep voice bellowed out, causing her devilish grin to widen further.
Glancing to her right in the direction of the roar, a plethora of enemy troops stood between her and the epicenter of battle. Luckily for her tastes, the more obstacles in her way, the better.
Eyes leveled back on the battle, she observed the skirmish before her. One, two, five, ten... separate skirmishes were being conducted all around, some ending quickly while others were relatively evenly matched. Promises of death and roars of vigor were traded between the two forces while she decided on a route to her target. Her eyes landed on a Human locked in a contest of strength with one of her pawns.
Lowering her body, Minerva dodged a poorly aimed mass of stone and lunged to her right, aiming for the Human. Whereas an attack like that wouldn't kill her, it would still hurt and slow her down while making her a target. Anyone seeing her resilience would immediately mark her as a substantial threat and they'd move to disable or avoid her. Whereas she'd usually welcome that attention, right now she couldn't afford the time sink.
Two long strides sent her fifteen feet across the field, propelling her right to the side of her first blood and flesh obstacle. Tucking her wings in, Minerva took a moment to contemplate how she was going to handle her first kill of this battle. She wanted it to be... memorable. They were still trading blows with their fists, both completely exposed to an attack from the side and unaware of her intent to interfere.
Grin staying firmly plastered on her face, Minerva coalesced a thin layer of ice on each of her fingertips as she drew her arms in front of her body. Ten feet away, she drove her foot into the ground for a boost of speed forward, the ground cracking outward beneath the impact as she covered the distance almost instantly. Like diving through a pool of water, her fingertips dug into the unsuspecting Human's side, slicing into his body and eventually ripping him apart as she tunneled through him with strength and momentum alone.
"FINALLY!" she giggled, somersaulting into a crouch on the other side of the standing corpse while it collapsed in her direction, blown sideways by the impact.
The scene caused a stir in the battle as a few of his nearby companions and her warriors froze at the gruesome sight. Not giving any time to react, she shot from her crouched position off to the left, planting her feet into another man's side while grabbing onto his left arm. With a shove of her legs, his side crumpled inward while Minerva left him with one less arm, driving it through the stomach of another one of his companions she'd jumped toward.
'This is it!!' she screamed in her mind as she rode the choking man to the ground before once again beginning to make her way toward the Minotaur, the sounds of her company raising a warcry in her wake.
Always on the small end, Minerva was never the strongest of her kind back on their homeland, but a ferocity and agility that was unrivaled made up for it. Topping those traits with a keen mind and the rare trait of patience, rising through the ranks was never difficult for her. But, regardless of how nice it felt to be in command, regardless of how much respect she was given, like anyone else of her race, killing and battle were what she yearned for.
This was what she yearned for.
One hundred feet before her stood the beast, finishing off one of her comrades while almost seeming to glimmer in the beautiful field of death. The space around her was littered with at least five mangled corpses, her retinue beginning to be less inclined to attempt to bring the leader down and aiming instead for small targets.
Minerva extended her full ten-foot wingspan and coated it with a thin layer of ice as well before leaping into a forward glide, staying low to the ground. Tilting to the left slightly, her wing on that side clipped the throats of a dog and Hellial both, soaking her feathers with streaks of blood. He was losing the fight anyway, better to take out the more skilled foe quickly than to bother saving her ilk. Turning herself back on course, her target seemed to have no idea she was about to die.
Minerva's eyes widened abruptly as that shine around the Minotaur brightened in a red hue for a split second, and then a cone of flame ejected itself in her direction. Tilting to the right enough to avoid the brunt of it, she curled her wings to cover her head and upper body while collapsing to the ground in a roll, sliding to a stop a few feet in front of the furry beast she was aiming for. Her eyes narrowed while scrutinizing the Minotaur before her, unsure of what had just happened. Her wings were both smoking while her left was bleeding profusely, raw and tender with most of the feathers were burnt off. Flight with it was most likely no longer possible for anything longer than a few seconds.
"Why'd you dodge! You seemed so sure of yourself!"
Eyes wide and scrutinizing, Minerva scoured the area for the origin of the voice while keeping her distance from the Minotaur. It was clear she wasn't the one to have spoken, yet the voice had definitely come from her direction. Concentrating mana around her eyes wasn't helping the endeavor any either and, whereas anyone else in her race would simply choose to attack, Minerva was trying to make sense of her situation first.
The Minotaur didn't seem to want to give her the time she needed, though. Stepping forward with a slam of her hoove, she sent a shockwave forward in an attempt to throw Minerva off before a mace came crashing down from above. Scoffing in her mind, a quick flap of her right-wing propelled Minerva out of the way, stinging from the earlier burn but completely bearable. The dodge had lifted her off the ground entirely, negating the attempt at utilizing a shockwave to disable her. The mace hit the ground to her right, obliterating where she'd been moments earlier and sending shards of rock out in all directions.
Landing on her left foot, Minerva lept forward in a bid to claw into her opponent's side but had to settle for a gouge in her right arm instead when a large bicep dropped down to intercept the attack. Following through with a light flap of her right-wing to change directions again, Minerva hovered across the beasts wide shoulders, tracing her claws across them to leave a trail of five red trenches across its entirety before she had to duck out of the way of an elbow coming from the Minotaur's left arm. Planting herself into the ground while crouching just underneath the arm, Minerva once again brought her hands together while aiming at the thick neck above her. Excitement flashed through her mind again. She hadn't known how talented this woman was and had planned to spend the entire battle stuck here, but now that the fight was ending, she was free to let loose a little, killing her way through the pack until the N'moran was secured. If things continued going this well, perhaps they wouldn't retreat.
Putting stray thoughts out of her mind, Minerva shoved her heels into the ground to end the Minotaur. Her body sped upward, blades on her fingers less than a foot from tearing apart the Minotaur's throat when the beast finally reacted, tilting her head to the side while crouching her large body, sweeping a large horn across Minerva's attack with more agility than she'd expect from such a large creature. Her claws no longer had access to the neck, instead gouging out fur and skin from the top of its head. Her right arm was similarly impaling itself on the horn and if she continued her trajectory, she'd likely crumple her own arm and impale her shoulder.
Biting down hard, Minerva extended both of her wings out and stopped her upward travel with extreme pain from the force exerted to her damaged wings, gripped the skull of the beast for leverage, lifted her feet in between herself and the Minotaur's left side, then shoved herself off, a few satisfying cracks sounding out before she landed fifteen feet or so away. The distance put her out of the brutes range, giving her time to plan another assault. Her opponent roared out in pain and cursed loudly before locking eyes with her, bloodthirst apparent in their expression.
"You almost had me there. A second later and I was a goner," the Minotaur said, glaring intensely across the field while holding her slightly deformed side.
Minerva didn't reply, using the time she had to heal the more intensely damaged section of her arm. The horn had gouged down into its muscle; healing that was a priority.
"What's your name? I'm Rouna," the Minotaur, Rouna, stated, body posture adjusting to one that showed confidence after their exchange.
Minerva's eyes widened slightly as the wounds on her opponent's head began stitching over, her dented side slowly popping back into place. Not even she could heal that fast. No Combatant she'd met and killed before could. Her mind cycled through the possibilities of the many Wards, Alterations, or Enchantments that could do this, yet those all would have lit up when she augmented her eyes like she had. Why hadn't...
"Not one for talking, huh?" Rouna asked, interrupting her thoughts again.
Minerva continued her silence, adjusting her battle plan. Perhaps it was better she actually distracted their commander rather than attempted to kill her. She'd come out worse for wear from both their exchanges and clearly, something or someone else was interrupting the battle. The confidence she radiated wasn't coming from nothing.
"Fine then. We'll let our fists do the talking!" Rouna bellowed, once again stomping forward.
Another shockwave assaulted Minerva's balance, but another light flap of her stressed wing and a dodge to the left and back saved her again. Rouna continued forward, swinging her right mace outward and following it with her left while Minerva dodged back and ducked under the second swing, sliding inward to slice at her opponent's side. Not fully committing, she backed off immediately after and avoided being stabbed by the rapidly descending horns. She thought to dive back in on her opponent's head while she was looking at the ground but decided against it, which turned out to be the correct decision. Rouna's left mace swung backhanded in front of her exposed head in an upward arc a half-second later, expecting Minerva to take the bait.
Moving in now that she knew the next attack was coming from the right mace, Minerva entered Rouna's vision for a split second as she slid beneath the haymaker swing and through the Minotaur's legs, dragging her claws deep through the back of Rouna's knees and muscle. Halting her slide after she finished passing through, Minerva rotated and threw her left hand forward, sinking her claws into the Minotaur's muscled back, searching for her spine. Before she could do any real damage, Minerva once again disengaged as the large body swung around, an elbow following the motion and aiming to slam into her side as her opponent collapsed to a knee.
Once again, the two found themselves staring at one another, though this time Rouna didn't attempt a conversation. Minerva chanced a look around the battlefield and grinned as one of her more promising soldiers tossed a demi-human through the line of carriages. Likely, the horn would be sounded soon. Turning her eyes back to her opponent, she'd already healed and was standing, charging forward with the same laughable shockwave and overhead swing.
Minerva began flapping her wing to duck off to her left again when the glimmering field around the Minotaur shined a bright blue, ejecting a giant ice spike directly into Minerva's path. Sensing the danger before it was too late, the Hellial's damaged left-wing flapped outward hard in response, slowing her down just enough to not catch her body in the spike but placing the wing in its path instead. The huge lance continued downward, ripping through the burnt feather and muscle to drag her to the ground, pinning her in place for the large mace that was rapidly descending for her skull.
Cursing herself for getting distracted and allowing her moves to be predicted, Minerva took a deep breath and tensed her muscles. Her body began glowing with a plethora of dark red lines as her left fist shot upward faster than she'd moved yet in this battle, slamming into the side of the mace and altering it's trajectory. The hammer buried itself into the ground a foot to her right with a boom that echoed outward across the battlefield while a multitude of small rocks and shards peppered her side. Not giving herself a second to rest, Minerva immediately drove her right fist into Rouna's stomach, shattering a hastily made barrier that had shimmered into existence.
Her opponent slid back from the impact, too strong to buckle from the strike but not heavy enough to stand her ground. Minerva swung her left arm back, utilizing the distance she'd gained to shatter the ice pinning her down. She stood up and gritted her teeth after, pulling on her left-wing and ripping it out of the ground while letting her breath out finally, red lines fading from her skin. Lifting her eyes up to meet Rouna's, she saw confusion and apprehension there instead of confidence as blood leaked from the Minotaur's mouth.
"You made me use it, commendable," Minerva said darkly, buying time.
"What did you do? What was that dark magic?" Rouna asked, obviously hurting from the way she was holding her stomach.
"Something I was hoping I wouldn't have to use until I fought someone much stronger than you," Minerva replied.
Rouna looked as if she was about to speak up again when a horn blew from the leftmost side of the battlefield, causing a smile to spread across Minerva's face. They'd finally broken through. Both turned their eyes towards the sound and witnessed as five small balls of red traveled across the sky toward the carriages, two being intercepted by motes of white that caused them to vanish while the last three continued unmolested, detonating the moment they contacted the wood.
"Retreat to the second line!" a distant voice called out, likely the second in command.
Any other day, Minerva would try and find that man. Today, however, Minerva didn't care about anyone else. The only person she cared about was the one in front of her. The one who looked like she was turning to leave.
"If you leave, I'll slaughter every troop of yours that I can come across before you're free to fight again," Minerva darkly promised, Rouna halting and looking back. "The moment you step away, you leave each of them to die."
It was obvious Minerva wasn't going to get the upper hand in this fight because of the third party she'd yet to find. Unless she became willing to burn more of her life force, she'd continue to lose their little trades and eventually succumb. But if she were to stay on the defensive, Rouna wouldn't be able to touch her. She'd be stuck trying to hit a target that moved too quickly, virtually useless for the rest of the battle. Unfortunately, Rouna seemed to realize that as well. The only thing Minerva could do at this point was threaten her. Elerian's all cared so much for their own.
It seemed the threat had worked, too; the large woman seemed wracked with indecision. Minerva decided to give her another push.
"It's clear I'm much quicker than you are. Just on the way here, I tore five of your comrades apart." An embellishment, but Minerva let it slide. "I'll seek out the weak ones and end them, one after another, starting with her-" she continued, pointing to their left at a battle between a Demi-Human and a Hellial as Rouna turned to look where she was pointing, "if you take one step away from me."
Both stayed perfectly still as they watched the fight from afar. The Hellial was clearly losing, a wing severed and lying on the ground while the Demi-Human swung her sword in arcs, sending wave after wave of some illusory force off of it and into the Hellial's crossed arms. A few seconds later, the Hellial's defense finally broke apart and the Demi-Human dove forward, driving her sword through its chest before a shockwave sent it sideways, ripping it out to the side while the Demi-Human's shoulder sent her opponent backward. The Hellial flew back from the impact, landing on the ground in a heap a few feet away. The woman paused for a brief moment to take a breath from the hard-fought duel before sensing she was being watched and turned in their direction. It seemed she noticed something was off and called out while moving toward them.
"Captain! I'm-"
"Retreat!" Rouna yelled out. "You heard the call!"
The Demi-Human froze, giving a confused look.
"But-"
"Follow your orders dammit!" the beastial woman yelled again, a slight tinge of desperation in her voice.
With another few seconds of delaying, the Demi-Human finally nodded and turned, speeding off to the area where the rest of the combatants were headed. Once far enough away, Rouna finally turned back to Minerva.
"You disgust me," Rouna spat out.
"Good," Minerva replied, smiling viciously as she sat down. "Still, I'm surprised you chose to stay. Abandoning those you've sworn to protect to save your own... how dishonorable," she hissed out, mirth apparent in her eyes.
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An explosion of wood and metal sounded off a few hundred feet to their front, sending shrapnel flying through the air in all directions and prompting Damien to cover himself and those nearby with a barrier of mana. As if sticking into a clear wall above them, all the small bits that made it this far froze in midair before he dismissed the shield and they fell harmlessly to the ground. Looking around, it seemed others deployed similar barriers though even in places they hadn't, damage wasn't severe. Mere cuts and scrapes with one person sustaining a more serious injury from a jagged piece of wood embedded in his shoulder, but it had already been ripped out and a nearby healer was patching him up.
Looking forward, the Hellial that had caused the commotion had already been torn to pieces by their group. The moment he'd stood up to scream, they had already sent a plethora of spells in his direction and more than a few had landed. Damien held off on helping, opting to continue charging his body with electricity even though he really didn't plan to use it. He still hadn't unveiled that ability to the public and would if he truly needed, but until then, he'd keep to the basics.
The group had gathered about fifteen Combatants and thirty Mages, with three healers situated near the center. Looking around, Damien recognized more than a few of the Combatants from the school hadn't stepped forward, but he could hardly blame them. It was much safer to be a Mage in this situation; the Combatants expected to keep literal Hellials off of them so they could sling spells freely. The level of danger they'd be taking on was astronomical, made all the worse by the fact that the enemy was bloodthirsty and many here had yet to see a real battle.
"Let's move forward; space ourselves about fifty feet in front here. We need room to fight," Garon stated. "Mages, in the event they break past our line, separate us from yourselves with whatever barriers you can create. Do not allow them into your ranks."
With that final warning, Garon marched forward, taking the group of Combatants toward the broken line in the carriages as Damien caught Toren shaking his head slightly out of the corner of his eye. Garon had done a great job gathering everyone together so far, leaving Damien hopeful at their chances as he watched his back, but his nerves were still on edge. If not for the fact that Toren, was with them, he might be worse off. The man didn't exactly specialize in combat, but a Celestial well over the age of one hundred would be useful regardless of that. If his mother and Adrenna would get back, maybe the rest of the stress he was feeling would disappear.
"Well, Queen and King of our esteemed academy, any words of encouragement for your fellow students?" Gallion asked, stepping into line to the right of Damien, next to his father.
'Yeah, don't die,' Damien thought, rolling his eyes at the Celestial.
Luckily, he'd found them and deigned to stay nearby. The man's presence was helping put Damien's mind at ease, a bit of normalcy during this moment of insanity.
"I should have taken Lemshire's deal," Damien mumbled.
"We'll be fine," Alexa replied, squeezing his left hand.
'So confident-sounding when you speak, huh?' Damien mocked in his head as nervousness radiated off the both of them in the pact.
Kastra was the only one who maintained a sense of calm, sat on his left shoulder, waiting for the opportunity to act, though she'd likely not get much of one. All three were staring forward, watching Garon and the rest move further away. Everyone hoped that this second line of defense was unnecessary but that was not to be. Before they'd even gotten twenty feet out, Hellials began filing through the wreckage one after another, sprinting along the ground or using their black wings to fly low. They filed through one after another in no apparent grouping, totaling around fifteen when Damien stopped counting. None were carrying weapons and luckily they immediately turned to attack, choosing to act individually rather than wait and come as a group.
Murmurs in the crowd around him sprang up left and right, blaming the guards for allowing so many through. Damien did his best to ignore them. Hellials were to a Combatant as Celestials were to Mages. In his eyes, it was lucky the force had been whittled down so low as is. No doubt the Caravan was guarded taking into account a typical raider, thief, or bandit party. Not Hellials.
Damien immediately set to work, pulling at the ground between himself and Garon's group. It sunk down as five pillars rose up, floating before him. Taking five seconds to condense them, and another two to sharpen the tips, he was left with five stone javelins, waiting for his demands. To his left, Alexa was doing the same but with water from the nearby river, crafting spears of ice. Even though she had made more, Alexa was also the first to send them off, following which the two continued lobbing multiple attacks into the oncoming string of enemies.
To Damien's chagrin, not a single attack had landed; the Hellials managed to dodge or outright bat away any projectiles that got too close.
"Dammit, this..." Damien muttered, irritated while crafting and sending more out.
Familiar with fighting up close, he recognized the flaw in the way he'd been training of late already. His effective range was anywhere from one hundred feet and closer, and definitely not with allies in between him and the opponents. He didn't have any wide range fireballs like Gallion was sending off and certainly not the accuracy or speed with spikes to kill anything. They all specialized in being up close, but unfortunately, being up close would likely kill him here.
Suddenly, three of the closer Hellials took to the sky while two around them failed to in time to dodge jagged spikes that came shooting up out of the ground. One died outright, taking the hit through her skull, while the other was merely slow to dodge and was impaled in his thigh. Capitalizing on the moment where he wasn't able to move, Damien threw three of his javelins in a belt, catching the trapped man in his chest and wings, pinning him further into the ground. He'd thrown the extras with the expectation of him dodging to the left or right, but it seemed they'd been unnecessary, if still a bit useful. Screams of pain they could hear from across the field came out of the man in a torrent, causing Damien's stomach to lurch while his pulse increased until a final explosion of flame from Garrett finished him off.
"Good follow up," Toren called from his right. "If I can pin more like that, I want you finishing them off. Gallion, try to force them to run closer together and Alexa, if you could shatter your ice into smaller shards rather than large spikes, it would be much more useful. Stop going for the showy kills," the man continued, giving advice while focusing on his own magic.
With a few nods, Damien got to work preparing his arsenal and Alexa began peppering wide areas with multiple shards of ice. None of them could exactly see the effects of their attacks from so far out, but from the way they'd slowed down, it looked to be working. Kastra fidgeted nervously on his shoulder, wanting to be more useful as she set layers of barriers on top of one another over the group, blocking the occasionally thrown projectile with ease.
The enemies had become warry of the attack Toren had used and started avoiding sticking too close to the ground, but that just made them easier targets for faster and deadlier magic. Alexa sent off several disks of ice that brought two out of the sky with severed wings, and a quick death was achieved when someone further down the line scorched one with what looked like a laser. Taking advantage of the ones Alexa had downed, Toren once again held them in place while Damien finished them both off with accurate bombardments from his javelins.
Unluckily, their success wasn't mimicked elsewhere. Only one other had been killed from what Damien had seen, and the Hellials were finally converging on the forward group. Rather than the groups clashing with the Hellial's side weakened though, it seemed that the ones to make it were entirely unscathed. The Hellials eventually got too close to their frontline for the Mages to hit them without fear of friendly fire, so they ceased fire. Everyone in the vicinity began to prepare themselves for the event they broke through.
Waiting for a loud clash that didn't come, the Hellials hit the front line like a wave of smoke, panic immediately sweeping through Damien's surroundings. His eyes widened in shock as he stared at the scene before him. As if the guards weren't even an obstacle, eleven of the Hellials cut through the forward line without reserve. Some slipped by using superior grappling techniques, others flew up and over before instantly redirecting themselves back to the ground, but almost all the savages had opted to ignore the Combatants before them entirely. All eleven of which were headed directly for the back mage group, unimpeded.