Chapter 44
“Invasion”
Kalysto approached the edge of the wide terrace that contained the drawing of a magic circle on the ground. The city opened up before her eyes, its wide streets and buildings made of stone welcoming her along with the dark shade of green of the vegetation surrounding the hill on which the tall castle she stood in was situated. Allowing her to see most of the city from above. But also of the nine gigantic monsters fighting the few armed warriors who dared to stand against them, while others led small groups of civilians, to the skirt of the suit of a huge statue of a man with a scepter and a crown on his head that stood right in the center of a large square, in front of the castle. Seeing that none of them came back out after approaching the magnificent statue, Kalysto thought it must be an escape route.
But that was not something she could help with.
However, while she thought she could leave the instant things got too difficult, she could at least help them buy a little more time while they evacuated the remaining people.
And a few free experience points would come in handy. Aside from the tree that had fallen to her left when she arrived, the wide terrace she was on seemed to be a safe place.
And while it wasn’t much damage she could do to these giant monsters, there were no other archers in sight, either. Or at least she couldn’t see them from the second floor of the castle and the thick vegetation to her left, blocked part of her view. The layout of the city almost seemed to follow the design of a falling drop of water, whose starting point began with the castle.
“Where are the rest of your people? Do you have so few warriors left?” And as she drew her bow to fire again, it occurred to her that, even if her new abilities couldn’t go that far, there was still something she could try.
The saintesses are supposed to have sacred energy, right?
“Dispel! Purification!” She summoned, and while the golden glow still flooded the arrow, she shot it in the Cyclops’ eye. The arrow buried itself completely in its target and the monster cried out in pain, bringing its hands to the wounded organ, letting go of the tree it had been using to keep away the elven warriors whose spears and swords were pointing at it. The golden energy still glowed from her arrow, as it seemed to burn every part of the monster that came into contact with it.
Curious. Excited, Kalysto prepared to shoot a second arrow and as soon as she did so, the voice of the elf next to her interrupted her from drawing a third.
“That was a good idea! Thank you for creating an opening for me, without sacrificing the soldiers," the elf stretched out his hand and a bright blue light shone around the magic circle that was created in the air in front of his open palm. [Ice spear] -he recited, and a gigantic ice spear was shot towards the cyclops, its tip pierced its broad chest and then stuck into the ground, anchoring the monster’s huge body to the earth so that the body did not fall on top of the soldiers, nor did it cause any more damage to the surrounding buildings. Nor to the small family of civilians the cyclops had been following before the soldiers interrupted it.
Kalysto’s heart pounded at such a display of power.
I want to do something like this! Kalysto was thrilled. Is this what a real wizard looks like? And she turned with the intention of taking a better look at him, only to see the smug, superiority-laden smile stamped on his masculine, handsome face.
Immediately, a pair of windows opened to the left of her. And Kalysto ignored them. She had forgotten to turn off the battle setting since Galatea had shown it to her the day before. And now, she was too excited to think straight.
Fuck training with Artemis. This is what I want to be able to do! What the hell will I have to negotiate with him in order to get him to teach me how to do that?
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Her face paled at the terrifying image, and bile rose in her throat.
“Do you think you can help me get rid of the rest?” asked the elf, his melodious voice forcing her out of the dark memories of her painful childhood. “I need someone to distract them while I prepare the summonings, and the rest of the archers were sent to the north gate, the few remaining to the south, when the alarms went off less than half an hour ago.”
They wanted them defenseless. She realized. It’s too much of a coincidence that they started attacking so close to my visit. Her paranoia was triggered. Who did they tell? How did the word get out?
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
At that instant, Kalysto again invoked ‘dispel’ and ‘purification’ on her arrows and began to fire them at the other two Cyclops that were five meters behind the previous one. And against the other four creatures, each with three eyes and four arms, whose height almost rivaled that of the Cyclops, but the dark blue of their skin made them stand out.
And though she had already completely blinded the six monsters within twenty yards of her, the elf at her side was barely finishing the spell.
Agility in a wizard, despite his great power, is indeed a problem. She thought, as she admired how the elf finished the multicasting and threw four giant spears at the four three-eyed creatures, which seemed to be much more agile and less clumsy than the huge cyclops.
One of the cyclops that was much lower down began to climb the hill, walking among the remains of half-shattered houses and traces of a fire while the bodies of other monsters lay on the ground or on top of the rubble of some buildings. Kalysto calculated that now that creature was within range of what she could attack. So instead of just standing around in a daze admiring how wonderful it was to see that ice sprouting from the magic circles that were drawn in the air, she focused on her new target. And after summoning ‘dispel’ and ‘purification’ to her arrow, the Cyclops turned around, revealing his profile as he slammed the tree in his fist into the surrounding buildings, the erratic movements of his thick, huge arms along with the leafy branches of the tree and the attempts of the soldiers who were surrounding him to keep him away from the small square in front of the castle, obstructing Kalysto’s view of the Cyclops’ small, elongated eye.
Shit! Fearful that the golden light of her spells would be extinguished, she chanted them again, and at the same moment that the elf launched two more huge spears, she launched her arrow, piercing the Cyclops’ ear hole. Immediately the monster screamed and turned around trying to find the culprit, he found her while she prepared another arrow and ran uphill towards the castle trying to reach her. At that instant, Kalysto shot another arrow, followed by a second one. Both entered his one eye, blocking his sight, causing the Cyclops to let out a cry of pain and drop the tree, which to her seemed to fall on top of one of the warriors who had been fighting him. Crushing his leg.
Kalysto felt guilty about her injury, but immediately forced herself to stay focused. And though she didn’t see the notification, she did feel the coldness of her ‘Mental Defense’ ability run through her body from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes.
And all compassion and guilt she had previously felt for the elf’s possible injury disappeared without a trace.
As did the other voice in her head.
The moment the cyclops brought both hands to his wounded eye, whose arrows glowed with the saintess’s golden energy worsening the wound. She turned to the wizard at her side.
“Can you get rid of that cyclops?”
“I think we make a good combination,” he replied, summoning another gigantic ice spear while the monster was still lamenting the wound and trying to remove the tiny arrows that escaped from his chubby fingers which suffered burns every time they came into contact with any of them, but that did not stop the stubborn cyclops from trying. Less than a minute later, the monster was pierced by a giant ice spear, stopping all the destruction and death his advance had caused.
“And I think you are perfectly capable of taking them out without my help,” Kalysto replied, as she saw how easy it was for him to get rid of those threats.
“That’s not entirely true. The spells take a while to be prepared, not counting the cooldown time, so I need someone to distract them in the meantime. Blinding them stops them from advancing and causing damage to both the people and the city, which buys me some time while the few soldiers escape and help the civilians to safety.”
“That sounds like a plan," she commented, thinking about how beneficial all that free experience would be for her. “we’d just have to get close enough to finish off the rest.” She commented, observing the second group of monsters that were much lower. But something to her left caught her attention. Amidst the thick leaves of the leafy tree that had been thrown against the summoning platform when she arrived, Kalysto caught a glimpse of a silhouette moving in the distance.
Then a new idea crossed his mind as she saw a new group of creatures that had four arms.
“Don’t you think you can shoot from here?” Asked the elf as she watched the group of cyclopes coming up the hill, completely oblivious to the ones she just noticed.
“I am a saintess, not an archer. This,” she added, raising her bow, “is my hobby.”
“In that case you have a very particular hobby,” he commented with the same calmness he had had from the beginning, while more magic circles of various colors this time kept drawing in the surrounding air.
Kalysto, realizing that he had not yet seen the new group, asked.
“What are those things?” And she pointed to her left, to the group of four-armed giants whose green-toned skin blended in with the leaves of the tall trees surrounding the city. Though they were as nearly as tall as the dark-skinned ones the elf had killed earlier, the newcomers had a horn atop their heads.
“Shit! Those are cuoekqles!...” One of the magic circles, the orange one, approached him and touched his fingertips -All soldiers fall back, get the civilians to the evacuation routes! A group of cuoekqles is on its way! The west side entrance has fallen! -His voice echoed through the surroundings and several horns began to blare in all directions, sounding the alarm.
All trace of calmness disappeared from that elf’s face as he recited several spells and more and more magic circles were drawn around, if before he had been being careful not to destroy the city, now he had sent everything to hell.
A barrage of spells fell on the monsters that still remained near the castle, fireballs and ice spears mingled as they burned and pierced the bodies of the remaining Cyclops along with that of the other four-eyed but hornless creatures further down the hill.
People ran between the streets as they escaped down small alleys and out of sight through secret passages that some warriors guarded.
Seeing that everyone was evacuating as the great wizard destroyed part of the city while slaying most of the monsters, except for the cuoekqles that had not yet finished breaking through the thick forest, Kalysto pulled her home stone from her inventory.
“This attack seems too synchronized to be a coincidence. When you guys finish solving your security problems, give me a call,” but when she muttered the code word, the home stone did not activate. And she was still there, standing in front of the mighty wizard.
What the hell? Kalysto thought, and a wave of fear swept over her as she lost the only safety she had to get out of there alive.
“Oh, no young saintess! You’re not going anywhere.”