Chapter 183
What Did She Do Now?
(Mallory)
Everything was frenetic, it seemed like everywhere Mallory turned around the civilization she had worked so hard to build up from the ground was being threatened at every corner. While it was expected to have losses during the land claim event, Mallory had fooled herself into thinking that she could avoid most of the major pitfalls.
No, she always accepted the thought of having at least 20 to 40% losses in claimed lands. Which was why when the idea for claiming over a thousand acres of land was first posed, the idea seemed flawed, but acceptable.
Even with forty percent losses of land, to a thousand acres, that meant that the guild would have six hundred acres. Not as many acres as the Legrand Empire had now managed to amass, but close.
There was also the mirrored shadow world of the dead that lay waiting right at the doorstep. With each parcel of land claimed, over a thousand elite ghost soldiers arrived.
Fortunately, they were still friendly, and most had been sent south to prepare for the inevitable fourth and final guardian spirit.
Yet, Mallory knew that would not be enough.
As the soldiers that arrived were not motivated to fight at the front lines.
Who could blame them, as they were designed to have human characteristics and mannerisms, meaning that if they didn’t see Midnight Hunter Soldiers nearby, then they would be less likely to willingly risk themselves for the benefit of the tenuously merging empires.
There was so much going on, that Mallory felt like she was drowning.
Not only was she drowning, but she now realized that the little ball of energy was the only thing keeping her and by extension the rest of the Midnight Hunters afloat.
Right now, everything was tenuous at best.
The two former Primal Protectors were highly damaged from their apparent losing battle with the water elemental.
Looking at the time remaining, Mallory realized that the worst would soon come to pass. Namely that she would be forced to engage with the last guardian before Cass got here.
It took her ten minutes to race here, using every burst of speed, energy, and remaining power potion she had and all she could do was watch as the monster got closer and closer to the lowest fields.
“Twenty percent.” Mallory spoke out loud to herself, realizing that this was the percentage she and her advisors all predicted would be lost. In the southern portion of the proposed claimed lands the guild found two unclaimed dungeons, none of which were the Library of the Tribunal. One unclaimed tower, and what looked to be an entire cluster of rare resources and at least one abandoned city that could be reclaimed with minimal efforts. At least, that is what her experts claimed.
In her mind, she knew that all of those components and likely more would be lost in the twenty percent of lands that would be burned by this rampaging dragon. Acceptable losses, well in the grand scheme of things they were acceptable. It was clear that the southern lands were the most resource intensive, which was likely why the most powerful creature was forced to appear there, but that meant nothing. If the lands were destroyed, then any value they had would also be destroyed. That meant the dungeons, the tower, the resources and the unknown city, they would all be destroyed thanks to the rampaging guardian.
Just as she was mentally preparing herself for the loss of lands and the inevitable pitched battle that would unfold, she received a message.
Hidden Guild Quest Unlocked: Mastering the Cardinal Protectors: Your Guild, the Midnight Hunters, has begun the process of conquering the four key protectors of the great wastelands. You must protect your lands, while not fully destroying the Cardinal Protectors of the Wastelands. Incredibly you even managed to bring one of the Protectors back from the brink of death. Current status of protectors that have been subdued but are still living (3 / 4). Rewards: Experience, Guild Title, variable.
“Cass, what did you do?” Mallory found herself asking.
Then realizing it was Cass, who was even more of a completionist than she was, she could only smile at the sudden change.
Looking to the enraged elemental, it was clear that it was already too late. While Cass had apparently brought the dead dragon back to life, Mallory saw that the fourth protector was still enraged.
Though, he did look momentarily preoccupied with something.
The enraged dragon looked around, scanning the area for a moment.
Seeing this Mallory could only use the moment to collect her breath, as she was still trying to recover from rushing over here within ten minutes. Despite her recently upgraded wings, there was still a limit to how much stamina she had, and how long she could continue to fly at full speed. In fact, even now, Mallory felt that landing on the ground would be the best course of action as she had already taken in the field.
The enraged dragon was about two hundred meters away from the nearest spiritual warriors, who themselves had only spears and swords to deal with an elemental creature that could clearly fly over them and rain down death and destruction.
Despite this, Mallory knew the warriors would stay, at least for the moment.
As guild leader, she got a special read out of the moral of her allies that showed their current moral and at what rating they would break.
Auxiliary Deolar Elite Guard Troops:
Morale: 40.
Break Morale: 20.
This meant that Mallory had twenty points to spare between where they currently were, and what it would take for them to run and scatter back to the Deolar dungeon.
At which point, the number of Midnight Hunter’s Guild deaths would skyrocket. Fortunately, Mallory had Gwen on Resurrection detail, meaning the number of losses weren’t being directly reported to Cass. And fortunately, so far, everyone that had been severely or gravely wounded was either healed by the mobilized roaming healer troop, or had been managed to be evacuated to Gwen fast enough that they could still be resurrected.
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There was a contingency plan for if a life had somehow slipped past the efforts that were in place, as no doubt Cass would take that personally. Honestly, Mallory didn’t know what would happen if a guild member actually died and was forced to be reborn with one of their remaining lives. In her mind, she knew that eventually such actions would be inevitable, yet Mallory could only see Cass somehow taking the death personally. As if she was able to prevent each and every death that the guild suffered.
As it was, there was an unspoken policy not to inform Cass about any accidental deaths that occurred to Guild members. Fortunately, there had only been a couple of deaths, and most were able to quickly regain the skills and advantages they lost in the rebirth process, but that was another reason why the guild wanted to have so many acres of land present, as it meant there could be re-training centers that would be hidden from Cass’s increasingly large vision.
As a Guild Leader, having a healer as dedicated to life as Cass was invaluable. As a friend, Mallory could only try to hold back the true harsh reality of the world that they lived in. That life and death hung at the edge of a knife. That gaining levels as she did, without actually fighting was an anomaly at best, and unsustainable for most. Well, except for Cass who managed to somehow get it so the world let her quest her way into power.
These thoughts and more raced through Mallory’s mind.
Tired.
If Mallory had to describe herself right now, her initial thought would be that she was tired. As of now she had been running around on this quest for over fourteen, no fifteen hours straight now. She could look at the timer for the quest, but avoided that, as it was a distraction.
Right now, the sun was slowly beginning to set, meaning it was nearing night, when the last major obstacle would no doubt be thrown their way.
So much was going through her mind, that she completely missed the displacement of air next to her.
“So what did I miss?” Cass asked.
Shock, then falling.
The sudden appearance of Cass spooked Mallory so much, that she was startled, froze up and then forgot to flap her wings to maintain her position in the sky.
“Get back up here.” Cass said, then Mallory felt the moment that her Telekinesis gently grabbed Mallory, and slowly pulled her back up to be level with her.
Realizing that it would almost be impossible to pull off the fact that she wasn’t frightened by Cass’s sudden appearance, Mallory decided instead to change the subject entirely. “You ready?”
“Funny, I was going to ask you the same.” Cass stated.
With that, Mallory felt a slight twinge of regret fill her, as she half hoped that Cass would have yet a fourth major miracle ready to go, in order to subdue this looming threat.
Then before Mallory could think or do anything, the timer for when the Cardinal Protector would move ended. A time that was marked clearly by the loud bellowing roar of the beast.
“I HAVE COME TO AVENGE MY FALLEN BRETHERIN! BEHOLD MY WRATH!”
Pain.
There was a mental feedback to the words that caused Mallory to wince and almost lose her concentration while flying again. Fortunately, she was able to regain her concentration quickly enough that she only dipped slightly, before being able to regain her position.
With that, the giant hulking beast began to move forward, right towards the line of impaired spiritual soldiers.
Despite being undead, they still felt a chilling debuff from the mental assault, as their formation began to break apart at the seams.
Worse, her counter all but told her of the same set of circumstances occurring.
Auxiliary Deolar Elite Guard Troops:
Morale: 30.
Break Morale: 20.
Ten.
The morale of her troops, well the auxiliary forces that had been called upon to help was lowered by ten. Meaning that they were close to breaking ranks and running away.
“I’ll go rally the troops,” Cass said, seeing the lines breaking and likely seeing the effects of the mental attack on them far better than Mallory’s tracker could ever accomplish.
“Okay,” Mallory managed. Then before she could ask what she was doing, Mallory felt a mental connection pierce her mind.
“Here we go. Setting up a Telepathic link for communications.” Cass said, her voice as cheerful as ever. It always amazed Mallory that no matter how bad times became, she always managed to have a calm and resolute tone to her voice.
Well almost always, there were times when she had that serious tone to her voice. That was the voice that her managers jokingly referred to as the stay still and hope to avoid her attention voice. As she would notice every movement but had a slight blind spot if you stayed perfectly still for long enough. It was odd, and something that she meant to tell her friend about, but somehow felt that this was not the time to express such thoughts.
“Good to know, thank you for that Mallory, but can you focus on trying to stall the Cardinal Protector that is about to destroy our hard-earned territory?” Cass said.
And like that, Mallory realized that having her mind open to a powerful Telepath like Cass was likely a bad idea.
Still, she had nothing to hide from her friend, at least that is what she told herself. Then forcefully tried to forget her earlier thoughts, as she instead realized that now she needed to focus her full attention on the giant beast.
Breathe.
Mallory forced herself to calm down with a deep breath, before letting it go and then charged forward.
As she got closer, Mallory could only think of three words that truly described the creature before her: Colossal, Powerful, and Beautiful.
Even coated in a layer of fire, the dragon that she was now charging to was beautiful. Deep blue and white flames coated a magnificently long silver body that looked like ash. In her mind, Mallory wondered if that was a safety trait that had been created for the dragon, as she could see dark streaks where the ashen colored scales met. In all the look was similar to that of a large burnt tree log, or other item that had been burnt but not completely consumed by flames.
“Huh, that is interesting.” Cass said, apparently seeing the dragon through her eyes, as she was still reading her thoughts.
“Oh yeah, I often forget, you can’t see the world the way it was meant to be seen.” Mallory thought across their bond.
“I wouldn’t say that, the way I see the world is probably more impressive all things considered.” Cass noted.
Mallory almost wanted to press, but then held herself back, remembering the pain of what seeing the world through Cass’s perception meant.
“Oh, good idea!” Cass responded mentally, excitement filling her thoughts.
Then before Mallory could even think about what had happened, or what moment of insight Cass had chosen, she felt a third mind join the mental bridge that had been created by Cass.
“What is this? Who dares to challenge the great mind of Flumberro!”
At that, Mallory burst out laughing. As she couldn’t help but find the dragon’s name ridiculous.
“You dare…” was as far as Flumberro got, before Cass did something.
Through their connection, Mallory knew that Cass was able to control, direct and force thoughts into those she communicated with. Now it seemed that she could feel and even experience the effect that this would have on another mind.
“GAHHH! STOP, make it stop!” Flumberro cried out in pain, and Mallory could only feel a little pity for what the great beast was now experiencing. As she knew full well what the beast was experiencing right now, as even with the filters on, a bit of the images that were being filtered from Cass to Flumberro were bleeding their way over to Mallory’s mind via Flumberro.
From the bleeding thoughts, it was clear that the information being forced into Flumberro’s mind was too much for his mind to comprehend. Mallory had felt the same way when it had happened to her, and that was with Cass filtering down her sight to what was important. Honestly, right now Mallory couldn’t remember what Cass had been attempting to show her, all she remembered was the white hot spike of pain that rested just beyond her eye as her mind tried desperately to comprehend the flood of images that were being forced into her mind.
With what she was experiencing from her sympathetic link to Flumberro, Mallory could only realize that either Cass’s ability to perceive things had increased, or she was not holding anything back in her transmission into Flumberro’s mind.
Bright blue streak.
From the mental connection a bright dark blue spot appeared to be racing towards them.
“Nagingah?” Flumberro called out, his thoughts momentarily able to pierce through the stream of information being forced into his mind.
“Yes, I managed to save her. Your rage, your wrath for revenge is pointless, as the reason for your anger has been Resurrected.” Cass said.
With that, Mallory felt a flow of relief coming from the mind of the burning dragon. A dragon that suddenly paused its forward progress, as it seemed to pinch its long snout as it tried to alleviate the mother of all headaches. But as she watched, Mallory noticed that the violent blue flames that seemed to dance around uncontrollably began to slowly settle down, and become manageable.
To her surprise, it was working.
Whatever Cass was doing, was working.
Then finally the blue blip came close enough that Cass could link its mind to the network. Why not, rather than having a private conversation on how to reorganize forces to have a strategic advantage, why not give away our capabilities and make it so our ability to relay vital statistics are impeded? Mallory thought to herself.
“You know, we can hear you, Mallory.” Cass said to her mind.
And like that Mallory once again realized she was really bad about keeping her personal thoughts private when someone was talking directly into her brain Telepathically.
“I’m here brother.” The gentler voice of the apparent blue dot, the dragon that Mallory somehow knew was Nagingah, at least according to the thoughts that were bleeding over into her consciousness right now.
“How is this possible? I felt your soul die and perish?” Flumberro thought.
And like this, Mallory found herself watching a dragon soap opera, complete with hidden tension, love, death, and of course resurrections.
“We can still hear your thoughts.” Cass said, once again trying to get Mallory to tone down the deep thoughts she was having.
Still, she couldn’t help but wait, if this worked, then Cass would have pulled off a miracle.
“Your call has been dropped,” Cass said into her mind. Then like that, she felt the mental connection to the other dragons and Cass end abruptly.
For a moment Mallory felt sad by that, as she had a really hard time figuring out how to keep her personal thoughts separate from what she was apparently projecting to others.
She was about to tell Cass that she was wrong, when she looked in the direction of the small blue blur and saw something that confused her.
At first, she thought that the blue dragon, this Nagingah, had been really far away. Yet, that was not the case. Instead, the Blue dragon was very very close, and most importantly, it had shrunk in size. Quite a lot in fact, as Mallory could now swear that the once majestic blue dragon was now, no, it couldn’t be.
“Is that a flying bright blue Pomeranian?” Mallory asked no one in particular.