CHAPTER 204
The antelopes closed on their position with the sort of pace that could easily give you nightmares. They were like cheetahs but faster.
Crack.
One of Everlyn’s arrows flashed across the distance, separating them from the rapidly descending monsters. It slammed home into the chest of the leading antelope; it tumbled and fell.
How she had hit it with such accuracy at that range was a mystery, but Tom was not about to complain.
Crack, Twang.
Both Everlyn’s and Jingyi’s arrows arced out. Everlyn’s flight course was almost flat while the scout was forced to use a parabolic arc, given how far the monsters were from them. Not that it affected his accuracy at all with his arrow slamming right into the nose of one of the monsters.
It was a great shot.
Three arrows, and that was how many antelopes had been downed. The deadliness of their skill was inspiring.
Another round of arrows flew. This time, even Jingyi’s arrow had a flat arc and both arrows slammed home into their targets barely fifty metres from where they stood. The separation they had created was gone. Two hundred metres vanishing in less than five seconds.
Tom stepped to the edge of the flat space to meet them. The antelopes saw him, hunger entered their eyes, and they targeted him. Mentally, he prepared for the critical first few seconds of the fight. Above all else, he needed to taunt as many of them as possible.
Time predictably slowed down, telling him he was about to take a pounding. He pre-emptively cast his decay resistance spell while he waited for the perfect moment to enrage the others. A teleport took him back and to the side. Then he was kicking off his feet, advancing till he was in the middle of the pack. He felt the shock of minor impact on his ribs as a passing monster managed to headbutt him. All in all, maybe a tenth of a second had passed, but it was enough.
Sparks exploded out from him.
They went forward, behind him, to the sides and some even straight upwards to meet an antelope that had tried to jump over him and all its pack mates to get to his companions, the easy prey, faster. The light was nearly as bright as what happened when his Lightning Dodge had activated. Almost blinding for him, but it must have been far worse for the antelopes who had to contend with the foreign electricity trying to wriggle its way into their eyes.
Hooves battered at him as he pushed through them. All the monsters focused their full efforts on destroying him. Like the previous time, there were so many of them and they moved so fast that all he could do was defend. There was no space for an offensive action.
Time slowed significantly once more.
It was the maximum that his skill supported, and Tom tensed, knowing what was about to happen.
A hoof slammed into his chest and threw him backwards. While flying through the air he crashed into other airborne antelopes and they gave way as his mass won out. Overall, it was only a couple of steps and thanks to his skill mitigating damage and that it had launched him back it was only going to leave a slight bruise. If that kick had caught him pinned against a hard surface, then Tom knew the outcome would have been quite different.
He parried away another kick and took a moment to monitor what was happening while his instincts guided his dodging. There were almost twenty antelopes focused on killing him and if he was being honest their scramble to reach him was actually reducing the risk of being injured. A large mob trying frantically to slaughter you and frustrating each other in doing so was not as threatening as what five in open space would have been. He could do this all day especially as his skin was only tingling by a slight amount.
The spell faded, and the prickling increased, but not enough to be problematic.
The momentum of the antelopes had pushed him back up to where the others were and he saw the other melee fighters unleashing attacks upon the undefended sides of the monsters.
They had free rein to do whatever they wanted without fearing retaliation, as every single monster was focused exclusively on trying to kill Tom.
Arrows flew, Toni’s air magic crashed down and Keikain had sensibly pulled back from the fight unwilling to use his power in a skirmish where they clearly already had the upper hand.
In surprisingly little time, the surrounding crush relented as his friends took down the monsters. With space once more, he reproduced his spear and started stabbing.
Tom maintained quick, precise movements even while weaving between them. The antelope in front of him tucked its head down and charged him. He teleported up and then plunged his weapon into the back of its neck. The blue glow that covered the tip meant it went in easily and penetrated into the brain stem.
It died, and he spun, looking for another enemy.
There were none.
He surveyed the battlefield while panting.
Everything was clearly dead.
His skin complained when he moved, but apart from that it was fine and he gave his arm a quick once over. It had a red tinge, but no blisters.
Six mana later and the redness vanished, and he turned to see if anyone else needed healing. It was clear at a glance that everyone excluding Thor had gotten through the engagement with nothing more serious than some minor sunburn.
Thor had not been so lucky.
Tom could only observe his face, but it was covered with boils and weeping sores. Michael was crouched next to him.
“Do you need help?” he offered.
“No, Tom. I’ve got this.”
“The wounds look terrible.” Tom examined Thor worriedly. He had suffered some significant decay exposure. It was problematic. “Why are you so banged up? Your amulet? It should have done…”
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Thor wave the question away. “I’m not wasting my five minutes of protection on a small band like this. Tis just a skin wound.” He smiled at his small joke.
“Literally.” Michael said dryly. “But an extra five or ten seconds and it could have become a lot more alarming. As Tom discovered the damage scales exponentially.”
“I was aware.” Thor insisted. “If they hadn’t been falling so fast, I would have triggered the amulet.”
“Recharge your mana and get ready.” Everlyn ordered. “That was nothing.”
She waved out to the distance and they could all see the two opposing forces sweeping closer together. Each of the forward raiding party so to speak had been eliminated. It was just the main groups left, and they were about to collide.
Tom used his experience from the tutorial to assess the situation. What would happen when the forces met?
Currently, both packs were staying well clear of the cliff wall where they were positioned, but once they clashed, they would spread out in both directions and widen the conflict line. “We’re going to end up part of the battlefield.”
“Yes.” Everlyn agreed. “The antelopes first because of the angles but then once the scorpoise start winning we will end up fighting them.”
“This is crazier than anything I ever did in the tutorial.” Rahmat said.
“Well, it’s not like we were given a choice.” Tom answered. “Everyone, remember to keep your discipline. Stay close, don’t chase any of them, even if you think you can get a kill. The only things that matters is survival. The more we keep out of battle, the better chance we have of surviving.”
The monsters crashed in front of them with little noise.
They could see the blows. A scorpoise that was in the air was struck with two front hooves and got pushed down almost two metres till it hit the ground. An antelope was enveloped by a different one of the rays and didn’t emerge alive. Yet, despite the clear violence that was occurring, there were no noises. No loud squeals, screams, or roars, just focused aggression and the occasional thud that carried over the distance separating them.
An ugly melee just like had been predicted. The two monster packs smashed together in the centre and immediately started expanding out to the sides.
“Don’t engage.” Everlyn warned them. “Let them come to us.”
Tom, along with the other front liners, took two steps backwards. The ten humans were pressed up against the rock wall in an attempt not to get spotted.
“Sort of wish we’d had time for Harry to cast one of his camouflage rituals.” Everlyn said quietly, with amusement.
The clash of the two forces was happening thirty metres to their right, which meant that it was inevitable that only antelopes would threaten them… initially at least. Sure enough, a crowd of around forty were pushed out and were running straight at them. For a moment he had fantasies about them galloping past, but it was not to be. The lead antelope spotted them almost immediately, and Tom could see that its mouth started frothing in response. It changed course to head straight at them.
With most of them lacking specific stealth skills and the enemy being rank twenty it was no surprise that they were discovered.
Tom tensed, and then they were upon them. This time, he didn’t bother trying to enrage the entire group there was too many, and they wanted to be a small target. It was survival Tom. That meant small footprint and hope that the antelopes would go around them and prioritise fighting their real enemies the scorpoise.
Instead, he focused on killing efficiently.
An antelope flipped at him and he dodged the side and lashed out with an elbow as it passed and scored a sold thump on its rib that, while failing to hurt it did successfully knock it off course. These things were light enough that it was easy to shift their momentum. Meanwhile, his spear took the opportunity to split open the artery of the creature that was attacking Thor.
It was chaotic.
Tom moved deliberately and preserved his mana. His focus was on the wider battlefield, and he watched how everyone else was going. The best use of his unique abilities was to step in and save them if they looked like they were about to be overwhelmed.
His friends were failing. Despite the skills they possessed, their attributes were too low. The antelopes ones too high.
A localised version of Lightning Enrage expanded around him. Sparks flew out to a range of about a metre and a half. The two attacking Everlyn turned to fight him along with a further seven pulled off the others. While he had not wanted to taunt anything, he had no choice.
With nine of them focused exclusively on him once more, Tom could suddenly do nothing but dodge, but his companions were freed up at least briefly. More antelopes engaged.
As we weaved amongst the fury bodies, searching for a chance to counterattack with his spear. He still watched the battle, knowing that he might need to intervene again to save his more squishy companions. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Clare get launched back two metres to slam into the hard, unyielding surface of the boulder.
Tom was already reacted his spear, lashed out to score a long cut on the offending antelopes flank. Instead of it pouncing on the helpless Clare it responded to the pain by focusing on Tom. He teleported away from some more attacks.
Clare was clutching her chest, a grimace on her face, but her healing magic was addressing the damage. She would be up and fighting in no time.
Time slowed, precariously.
He attempted to calculate where the attack was coming from but then realised it was from everywhere. He was being kicked from multiple angles and the teleport was on cooldown. He accepted the contact and used his spear to block a couple of blows and then twisted to avoid to two more.
He was pummelled from different directions and then a gasp of pain escaped his lips as a kick he had not been tracking struck his calf. A single abscess burst in his lower leg.
He forced himself to keep going.
Thor skidded backwards his hand clutching his thigh. He roared in defiance and swung his hammer and an antelope that was dashing in for another attack got knocked away, as it’s lighter weight met the furious swing of Thor’s hammer, and was found wanting.
They had traded blows and the antelope, unlike Thor didn’t get up from where he landed.
Crack
One of them flipped with a magical arrow embedded in it.
Tom allowed himself to relax slightly. If Everlyn was targeting the monsters focused on him, then no one else was in danger.
He saw an opportunity and teleported forward to avoid more of the nasty kicks and also to kill one of the animals that had overextended itself in a bid to hurt him. It died with his spear through the roof of its mouth..
Then, when he looked for a new enemy, there was none. The twenty that had targeted them were all dead the others had swept past to engage the scorpoise.
“Oh, no.” Thor yelled and pointed up the cliff.
Tom followed the finger and then froze.
Emerging almost a hundred metres over their head was a swarm of alligator sized lizards. They had appeared over a vast section of the cliff face and Tom remembered Jingyi’s uneasiness at coming close to the wall and realised this was why.
They had emerged as a result of the sounds of battle and now, as one they started sprinting down the near vertical cliffs. Tom’s eyes widened at how fast they were moving. They were not rank twenty monsters but were instead in the high twenties. To fast for him and probably beyond the limit and he could effectively defend against even with a tier five dodge skill.
Then he swallowed those thoughts. He had a chance against these, but the others… They would die in seconds.
Of the mass of enemies, only three were heading toward them, but that was too many. Tom knew he might be able to fight one to a standstill and then as his cockroach advantage of fate built up to kill it… but three it felt impossible.
“Tom, you take one? I’ll take the other two.” Everlyn snapped immediately. “The rest of you keep the riff raff off our backs.”
“I’ll target the one on the left.” Tom said, moving to intercept it.
“Tom, fate spike one of mine.”
He knew what she was asking, and he didn’t hesitate. The ring activated as he targeted the bigger of the two heading for Everlyn. Instantly he saw its pool of fate vanish and without anything physically changing it was far weaker than it had been.
Then, as the monster he was targeting approached Tom spent all but ten of his remaining fate. All of it directed toward surviving the first twenty seconds against the creature charging him.
Part of him was worried about Everlyn. Why would she take two on at once but then he put her out of his mind. She needed to fight her own battles, like he did.
And his only concern right now was the lizard coming at him.