The cloak only prevents them from scrying me directly, if they look at the area they could still spot me. However, when I try to stop it and put the fire gem away I find out that I can't. I am no longer in control of the situation and that worries me even more.

Despite using all of my strength, I can't make the fire gem move at all. When I let go of it, it just continues to float there sucking in all of the fire. As I watch, I can see the wall breaking down to provide more and more fire.

At this rate, what is left of the wall should be gone within an hour at most. The problem is that that means the gods and goddesses will have more than an hour to notice me. As I am trying to think of what to do, my communication amulet vibrates.

Lin says "Ash, what is going on? What did you do? The magic in the association is going berserk!"

"Um, I am playing with fire?"

Lin says "Well, stop it!"

"Actually, I already tried and I can't! I took out the fire gem to absorb some of the fire wall and it worked too well. It is now absorbing everything and I can't stop it or move it."

Lin says "Ash, didn't you tell me something about that gem being related to the fire god somehow?"

"Yeah, it tried to use my body to bring the fire god back. Oh, uh oh!"

Lin says "What are we going to do?"

"I want you to go grab the castle and head to the ship. As soon as you are on board, order Athena to set sail. I will catch up."

Lin says "Alright. Stay safe and don't do anything stupid. Well, anything else stupid."

"I'll try, but no promises."

Lin says "Well, at least you are honest. I will see you soon."

Lin breaks contact and I turn my attention back to the fire gem, trying to think of what to do. I certainly didn't think this through properly, if the gem absorbs enough power it will turn into a god. While I am pretty sure a god of fire can't hurt me, the city is another story.

As the gem continues absorbing the fire, I can hear sounds of fighting in the distance. It sounds like the adventurers have their hands full and the sounds are getting closer. I attempt to create a barrier around the gem to stop the flames, but it shatters instantly.

In fact, the gem lashes at me with its power, but it doesn't do anything to me. Obviously, the gem didn't like me trying to interfere with its energy source. Since I can't block the fire, the only other thing I can think of is to absorb it.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

I already know that my absorb skill won't work, but that isn't my only option. After all, the fire is being made from mana and I can still manipulate mana. So, I start gathering the fire as fast as I can and start feeding it into a spell.

If I just try and absorb it into my body it will damage me since my mana is already full. So, instead I convert the fire back into mana and start constructing a spell. I am absorbing and refining the fire just as fast as I can to keep it from the fire gem.

Hopefully, if I can steal enough of the mana, the gem won't have enough to resurrect the god. Unfortunately, I can't seem to examine the gem right now so I don't know how much it needs. This means that all I can do is take as much as I can and hope that it is enough.

However, the more mana I use, the bigger the spell needs to be and that could be a problem. After all, there is no point in trying to save the city only to destroy it myself. My best bet is going to be to create a spell to target the demonic beasts.

However, as big as this spell is going to be, it will also kill the adventurers. As I am trying to think of a solution, I feel several spikes of power from within the city. When I look over I see multiple pillars of white light coming down from the sky.

It looks like some of the gods have noticed what is going on and plan to do something. The pillars are either them creating avatars, or sending down their servants. Either way, I am probably going to have company soon and I doubt they will be friendly.

I turn my head to glance at the harbor and I am glad to see the ship is already moving. As long as Lin and the others are safe, I can do whatever I need to do. Even if that means fighting against multiple avatars, so I ask a guard to fetch Almort.

Almort says "Ash, what do you need?"

"I need you to evacuate everyone away from the wall and get as many as you can into shelters. Also, do you have a way to tell the adventurers to retreat behind the wall?"

Almort says "Um, if we ring the bells they should retreat. Why? What are you going to do?"

"I am creating a spell that will kill everything outside the wall."

Almort says "What?! Uh, alright, I will ring the bells!"

Almort takes off running and I can't remember ever seeing him so flustered. I figured that by now he would be used to me doing insane things, but I guess not. Depending on how this goes, I may have to give up on the idea of opening trade here.

Luckily, I can just open trade with the southern empire instead since they are already my ally. I will just have to wait and see how things end up going, it might not be that bad. A few minutes pass and then the city's bells start ringing and they keep ringing.

This isn't like the signals I have heard in the past, this is more like an emergency alert. However, I don't worry about that and keep working on stealing mana for my spell. If the adventurers can get out of the way, then I won't have to worry about collateral damage.

Since I don't have to worry about the adventurers, I know what kind of spell to use. Normally, I would use a fire spell, but that would defeat the point and just feed the gem. I can already see the groups of adventurers retreating and the demonic beasts are right behind them.

As I feed more mana into the spell, dark clouds start to gather above the lands outside the wall. However, as I am feeding mana into the spell I notice that the fire gem has started glowing. I get the feeling that something bad is about to happen, so I get a little reckless.

I add a new part to the spell that will allow it to gather mana from the fire on its own. Now the gem has me and the spell stealing energy from it, I just hope it works. The downside is that now the spell will grow until there is no more energy.