"Yes! Hahaha! Finally!" Zeron shouted in excitement as the mages sprung into action.
Activating the speed, Lakan and Hark dashed out of the coach through the other door and took cover beside it on the other side. Hark invoked a reinforcing spell, a pale disk of energy appeared on his palm, and he smacked the palm on the coach, a thin film, not unlike the one that appeared around speed users, wrapped around the coach, protecting it against the projectiles that were being launched against them.
"It's over for you bastards now!" Zeron taunted as Binko rounded the coach and hid behind it.
"Fuck!" Lakan lamented. "I'm low on spells."
"You didn't bind spells yesterday?!" Hark exclaimed in anger.
"I fell asleep, sorry!" Lakan replied, gritting his teeth, Spells continued to ricochet off the coach, they ignored the coach driver's pleas for help, and Zeron's continued taunts.
"You idiot!" Binko cursed. "What spells do you have left?"
"I have 5 classic armors, 8 white blasts—" He began.
"you only have 8 white blasts?"
"Yeah."
"Damn it, we need to wave—"
A dark figure came around the coach and grabbed onto Binko, cutting her short, she quickly invoked a hot fist spell and punched the figure away, He had a defense spell that allowed him to recover and launch an energy blast towards Binko.
Hark and Lakan tried to help her but were quickly occupied by two other people, the shield that Hark had put around the coach remained in place, trapping Zeron and the hover coach driver inside it.
Hark and his attacker were evenly matched and they exchanged blows with a rapid flurry of exchanges, blasting each other with energy attacks that ricocheted off their defense spells.
Binko's furious fighting style drove her attacker backwards, with her hot fist and her speed, she launched an onslaught of attacks that aimed to break her attackers defense spells down.
Lakan was in trouble.
With Hark and Binko occupied, he decided to dodge and defend against the energy blasts that his attacker sent his way, he realized the attacker was using an elite defense spell, that could withstands thousands of buddle. Eight energy blasts wouldn't even make a dent, and he probably even had way more spells.
His attacker fired about two dozen energy blasts at him within the space of a minute, He dodged most of them, absorbed a few into his magical defense film, each attack hurt and the vibrations shook his bones, even under a spell dampener, magic could be devastating.
Binko stopped to catch her breath after her rapid fire punches, her attacker used the chance to trap her feet in a gripping spell, the ground latched on to her feet. She cast a blast spell at her feet to blow the rock away.
He launched a fire blast at her, She dodged and sent a punch directly on to his chest. His defense spell broke, finally overwhelmed by the amount of attacks, She quickly took the chance to invoke a hot fist so she could burn through his torso, but he was faster, he jumped backwards and invoked a defense spell, when her punch landed, the magical film was there to protect him.
Hark wanted to think about Lakan, but he was occupied. This attacker was skilled, Only one type of mage could realistically go up against Aku'andans, Ganz men. Not that that wasn't obvious, but only Lakan had seen them in action, and Hark was surprised at how skilled they were.
He invoked three more spells, his attacker responded with his own, their blast spells collided, pushing them backwards with a blast of air. Hark recovered first and rushed to his attacker, using the speed to punch his defense rapidly. It degraded and broke, he landed one punch, a rib broke, but then he realized the mage had sacrificed his own defense to launch small energy streams that bombarded his own speed, degrading it. The mage, using the superhuman strength from speed, grabbed his forearm and twisted.
Both Hark and the mage cried out in pain and jumped away from each other, they invoked new defense spells, The mage grabbed on to his broke ribs and Hark to his torn elbow.
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Lakan's attacker quickly figured out that he was out of attack spells and quickly capitalized in degrading his defense spells, Even though Lakan's dodging techniques were amazing, the mage focused on slamming his defense spells with thousands of buddles in energy blasts, breaking them and forcing Lakan to invoke yet another. He cursed his chronic procrastination that made him bind spells when he was dangerously low and stop once he had just enough.
By the time Hark's elbow had been twisted, Lakan had gone through three defense spells, he had only two left, while his opponent still had his original defense spell,
Binko's attacker had gone through five defense spells under Binko's ruthless onslaught. She had years worth of brutal attack spells she carried everywhere, having bound spells daily for over half a decade, whether or not she was on a mission, plus, she was very angry, and concerned for Lakan. She wanted to finish this quickly.
But her attacker was well prepared as well, he also appeared to have a seemingly bottomless pit of spells to counter her with. She decided to find an opening, a gap between a broken defense spell, and the invocation of a new one. They went back and forth... She heard Hark's grunt from a few meters away and cursed under her breath. She dared not look, she fired off another white blast. and invoked a halfmoon white blast, a more powerful but less dense blast, to launch it.
Lakan finally got to his last defense spell. He mentally prepared himself to die. He still had his eight white blasts, two halfmoon white blasts, five fire balls, a few hot fists, green blasts, and energy blades, all of which would just be barely enough to degrade his opponent's armor if he could get every single shot to land at the precise point on the armor at the right time, an impossible task.
He stumbled backwards as a particularly nasty green blast slammed him in the abdomen, he heard the slight crunch and then hiss of his defense armor cracking.
"Fuck..." He gasped under his breath. His attacker realized it too, because he stopped attacking and walked slowly towards him, certainly to savor killing him slowly.
the attacker invoked a hot fist. and punched him.
Punched him on the stomach, the thighs, the shoulders, weak points in the armor, the cracks multiplied, they were invisible cracks, but they were slightly audible. Lakan looked at him defiantly, both men knew what was about to happen, but Lakan refused to cower.
He punched Lakan leisurely, clearly savoring the moment.
Lakan's energy armor finally gave out. He stumbled backwards. The mage reached into his pocket and brought out a physical blade. Lakan winced. In a cold voice, the mage spoke.
"This is the easiest kill I've ever had." He said. "Thank you."
And then he stabbed Lakan in the stomach,
And then he twisted the blade and pulled it out.
And then he joined the mage fighting Binko as Lakan slowly collapsed on the ground, holding his stomach, gasping as he lost blood as he hit the ground, he finally found the chance to invoke a wave spell. The link happened, but by the time Keri's voice came on, He was too hurt to speak, as he drifted out of consciousness, he heard Keri's voice calling to him. He wept.
Out of the corner of his eyes, Hark saw Lakan go down. He screamed and ran to Lakan, but his attacker cut in front of him.
"Get out of the way!" Hark shouted, grabbing the mage with the speed and flinging him off to the side, the mage grabbed on to him and they both tumbled off to the side. The mage held on to him, denying him access to mage. He struggled to move but the mage held him back.
"watch him die, miserable and alone." the mage whispered into his ears, with a eeriely calm tone.
"You bastard, Leave me alone!" Hark shouted, fighting blindly with his one good arm, the other mage didn't seem to be in pain, although he groaned every once in a while, he seemed very functional, blocking Hark from getting to Lakan.
Binko was immediately overwhelmed by the two mages, they flanked her and countered her every attack, causing her to burn through her first defense spell, and before she could invoke another, they got to her, punching her in the stomach and kicking her. She vomited and doubled over.
She invoked another defense spell but both mages held on to her, pulled her up and pinned her against the ground and took turns punching her with hot fists attempting to degrade her armor. She screamed in anger and fought back with her speed, but the men were also infused with speed and overpowered her.
But Keri found them, and she wasn't alone.
Against all odds, she found them, and entered the fight with a flurry of white blasts that caught the mages on Binko unaware. One unlucky one, the one originally fighting Binko, lost his defense and got his tummy burned being slightly grazed by a white blast. He quickly threw up a defense spell.
Serene was also with her, as well as another Seyrulan mage, the one who had been with Lakan during Karan's coronation. His name was Yarlo.
"He's hurt!" Hark shouted to Yarlo. "Please help him!" The mage moved to attack Yarlo but Hark pulled him away and kept him occupied, Serene Joined him.
Yarlo quickly examined Lakan. He was lying in a pool of his blood, but he still had a very faint pulse. His hand was grabbing tightly to his wound. He got to work stabilizing Lakan, and wrapping him in a magical sheath to regulate his temperature. Then he carried him and rushed to a nearby healer.
With the help of the Seyrulan mages, the attacking mages decided to flee. one of them rushed to free Zeron, then upon signaling the others, they all fled.
The mages were too exhausted to pursue them.
Hark's elbow had swollen so much it was bulging out of his tight sleeve. Only Binko came out unscathed.
"Thanks Keri. Thank you Keri. We're so grateful."
"Thank Lakan. He decided to wave to me, and I could literally hear his heartbeat going out of whack as I linked up to him." Keri replied.
Binko chuckled in relief, and Hark shook his head.