Chapter 118: Wings of war (Second Part)
“Thaznec!” I exclaimed in surprise while putting another wave of nausea under control.
“I told you to call me Taz!” immediately replied the young Dwarf with the same hurried voice I had heard him use a few days ago. At the time, he had been having breakfast with Jazor and didn’t make that good of an impression as he had appeared like an immature dwarf a bit too eager to prove his value to Jazor.
Now, as I understood that it was his magic that had stopped my uncontrollable fall from the sky before he physically prevented me from falling off the roof of the five-story building where I had unknowingly landed, I wanted nothing more than to sing his praise to Jazor and everyone willing or not to hear.
“Thank y—”
“—You crazy bastard!” he interrupted as he vigorously shook my body either to make sure I was conscious or to simply end my life once and for all.
“Easy, I’m hurt,” I managed to mutter as the pain in my back and arm flared once again.
“No kidding!?!” he snorted. “You just fought a whole flying horde by yourself! If you want to commit suicide, do it when I’m not responsible for your safety!” he immediately rebuked with genuine anger and apparently pent-up frustration, but thankfully also while stopping his shaking.
“What do you mean?” I asked, baffled.
“Jazor asked me to keep an eye on you while he was away. When I saw you enter the mine with everyone else, I thought that nothing could happen to you specifically. How was I supposed to know that you would suddenly go out on your own to fly into the sky like a suicidal maniac!”
His erratic speech delivered at bullet speed would have made it difficult for me to understand his words a few years ago when I was still learning this world’s language. However, the message he delivered was more than just heartwarming.
Even in this situation; even when going to the frontline himself, Jazor had asked his friend to take care of me. This decision had just saved my life for I knew I would have never been able to stop my fall on my own.
Still shaken by my near-death experience, it took me a few more seconds to clear my thoughts.
“Sorry, and thank you Taz.” I offered while turning to look him square in the eyes. This finally seemed to somewhat pacify this erratic Dwarf who hadn’t let go of my body as I rested on the rooftop, for now, unable to stand on my own.
“I can’t even fly myself, so how can a kid like you move like that? Were you a bird in your previous life? You were, weren’t you? You have to be!” he complained after only a few seconds of silence.
The headache that had lessened started to come back with a vengeance as Thaznec continued to bombard me with his griefs growing more and more distant from me as he went on. I was ready to interrupt him to remind him of the seriousness of our situation, but after catching my breath and clearing my mind for a bit, I realized that we weren’t alone on this rooftop.
A quick glance around showed that several dozen dwarves, armed with bows, were positioned on several rooftops all around us. They weren’t idly looking at the approaching horde but fired unnaturally-fast arrows that passed unimpeded through the now almost translucent barrier. The horde was still quite far, but the arrows fired had little trouble reaching them and started to thin out the incoming crowd of birds, apparently furious to have failed to finish me off.
The giant shadow that this quickly approaching wall of feathers projected was finally enough to make Taz shut up and focus his attention on the sky.
The shrunken barrier was almost within arm’s reach of our building— among the tallest, proof if we needed one that the situation was still critical. Taz’s somber face and sudden silence as he picked his own bow were also proof enough that we definitely weren’t out of the woods yet.
“Get down and join the others, Sillath,” he ordered in a harsh voice, very different from his usual tone. “If the dome breaks, go seek refuge inside the mine!”
“Inside the mine? Don’t treat me like a kid, I know just as well as you do that if the magic disappears, we’re all dead, and hiding inside the mine will not change that!” I countered.
Taz started firing incredibly powerful and quick arrows instead of answering me, but his silence and the resigned look on his face was the only answer I needed.
“Don’t you have anything better than normal arrows?” I asked, my frustration mounting as I scanned the area for anything that could make the situation tilt in our favor.
“If I did, I would have used it already!” he screamed over the sound of the now familiar dreadful silver rays raining down on the almost translucent barrier. “The Lost magic stops any magical attack on both sides and none of us can fly as well as you do.”
Of course, I knew that as well.
We also both knew that the arrows they were all firing weren’t enough to stop the horde. Numerous birds fell victim to the apparently magically powered shot, but there was simply no end to them. Sooner or later, the rain of arrows distracting them would thin out and their attacks on the dome would resume at full strength. How long the fading shield of light would last at that moment, I couldn’t know but definitely not long enough to change our fate.
The only other way to fight this horde was to leave the Lost magic’s protection and confront them directly in the sky as I did for as long as I could. If a mage strong enough and sufficiently proficient in flying existed inside this city, I seriously doubted that he or she would have waited this long to act and defend the city.
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No, the frightening truth was that we were on our own and despite Taz's best efforts, despite the welcome support and respite he and his comrades offered, it didn't change what was ultimately awaiting us all.
We were all going to die.
For an instant, Sooreman’s warning crossed my mind. His promise of doom taunting me as if he had foreseen the growing despair that would grip my heart in its cold vice. His voice swirled in my head as I watched helplessly as the rain of arrows slowly but surely started to dwindle— unable to contain the endless wave that flew through the sky with cries of madness begging for blood and violence.
Perhaps with more men to shoot them down the situation would have been different, but the town’s defenses were stretched too thin for too long to have this kind of hope.
Maybe if I had intervened earlier, things could have been different.
Various scenarios born out of guilt and growing despair flashed through my mind as the reality of our situation settled in front of my eyes.
We were on our own and arrows were our last defense.
When they finally ran out, our fate would be certain.
The onslaught of bolts continued for long minutes with the screams of the men shooting them unable to cover the almost constant screeching noise of the birds. It could have been my imagination playing tricks on my tired mind but I could have sworn that their shrieks were growing in intensity as if they could realize that victory was finally close at hand.
However, that shouldn’t be possible.
The ambient mana was supposed to have completely stripped them of any form of intellect. That’s why they attacked the city in the first place. As doubt started to grow in my mind, I remembered how the birds had hesitated to attack a few times during our confrontation, how on several occasions they hadn’t completely disregarded their safety to attack as a deviant should have done. Even now, with the dwindling number of arrows, the horde didn’t press forward as if they were waiting for our supplies to run out before finally committing on destroying the Lost magic.
As I came to a realization, my eyes widened and my heart skipped a beat.
If I was right, we still had a chance.
The thought compelled my body to awkwardly stand up on the broken tiles of the roof, but the sharp pain in my right knee and the visible swelling indicated that my fall had done more damage than I initially thought. The vicious pain in my back that doubled in intensity when I tried to straighten was even more worrying, but none of that mattered in that instant.
As I focused on gathering my mana, Taz halted his firing for an instant to turn his attention back to me.
“What are you doing? You can’t fire magic from inside the city!” he started before drawing his own conclusion. “Don’t, you idiot!”
I didn’t have the time to explain what I planned to do, nor was I sure something like that could be explained. However, I knew with absolute certainty that I couldn’t fight in the sky as I did before. All I had was a theory, a belief, and the distant hope that it would help us buy time.
I closed my eyes and turned my focus inward, trying to ignore the nerve-wracking spectacle threatening to overwhelm us all.
I couldn’t let doubt cloud my mind.
I couldn’t let fear and apprehension destroy this slim chance of survival I had found.
For it to work, I only had one try.
“You made me do this!” I suddenly screamed from the top of my lungs.
I caught Taz’s expression, from surprise at my sudden outburst to shock at the growing wave of mana that I summoned at the same time.
With a violent clap, I crossed my forearms in front of my chest and unleashed my slumbering mana as I did that day when Alianelle fell into slumber. Like a ravenous beast waking up after being suppressed for too long, it immediately escaped my control and rampaged throughout my body like a raging inferno devouring everything in its path.
This power wasn’t natural, nor was it gifted or earned.
It was taken from dozens of innocent people who had the unfortunate fate to cross paths with my master in my previous life. I ended up with this power, but never tried to use it, for I knew the price to pay.
I hadn’t summoned any magic yet, but the raw mana coursing through my veins threatened to tear me apart from the inside out. My muscles strained and my bones ached as the growing wave of mana slowly awakened from deep within me.
I struggled to keep this power from consuming me, knowing what would happen if I let go. Taz's faint voice barely reached my ears amidst the chaos. The relentless screeching of the birds, their silver rays pounding against the magical barrier with a deafening force, mixed with the frenzied screams of the people around as they fired arrows in all directions along with my own screams of pain made it difficult to understand his words.
"What’s happening?" I finally managed to hear.
I wanted to explain to him what I wanted to do, but I couldn’t.
I certainly couldn’t spare the effort in this instant, but I could have before. All it would have taken from me would have been a few words.
However, I couldn’t risk the birds hearing me.
Deviants were devoid of intelligence and would disregard their own safety to satisfy even for an instant their thirst for blood and violence.
True deviants that is.
I had met such monsters not that long ago, so I could say without any doubt that the birds of this flying horde desperate to tear us apart and driven to attack this city weren’t true deviants.
No matter how ferocious they were or how violent the ambient mana had made them, they never truly let go of this last strand of sanity they kept within themselves, just like I didn’t let go of my last strand of control over my raging mana.
And that made all the difference.
Through my blurry vision, I saw the insurmountable wall of feathers waiting beyond the arrow's reach for the right moment to attack began to clear. A single ray of light managed to pass through this dense clutch of feathers, and when it did, the whole crowd began to disperse, reigniting our hopes of survival once again.
True deviants wouldn’t let go of their bloodthirst nor would they stop their attack.
They wouldn’t let other emotions or any semblance of sanity overcome their wrath.
There was no doubt in my mind anymore.
No matter how much the ambient mana influenced their actions, it hadn’t made all these birds forget the one thing all living beings had deep within them from the moment of their birth.
Their survival instinct.
I couldn't confirm the accuracy of my theory, and I lacked the means to seek Taz's opinion. The possibility that some of them may have been intelligent enough to comprehend my words prevented me from directly asking. Above all else, I knew I would only get a single chance to instill doubt and fear in their hearts clouded by their fury and madness so I took it.
It wasn’t just a bluff.
It was a gamble.
All this mana that continued to gather and radiate from within me in a torrent of pain and power wasn't yet shaped. Once I did, there would be no turning back for me and potentially for them. If they decided to attack, despite the crushing amount of mana I had managed to summon, I would lose.
However, I knew probably more than anyone else what the cost of hesitation was. Once it took hold of you, it was like a disease that continued to grow and spread. Their newfound hesitation was clear for all to see, and without exchanging a single word with anyone around I knew they had reached the same conclusion as I did.
For the first time, fear had changed sides.
The oppressive shadows they were projecting on us were full of luminous holes now. However, they weren’t all gone yet. They had retreated and eyed me warily, probably waiting for a sign of weakness. It wasn’t over but for now, this respite was enough.
We had been given a chance, a glimmer of light in a world of darkness. I could feel the hope rising in the hearts of my allies, as they looked up at me in awe and wonder.
It was not over yet, but we finally had a fighting chance.