Azura could pretty confidently say he hated skeletons. They weren’t strong, but as with most zombie type monsters they could just rebuild themselves when destroyed, and the Bone Graveyard gave them plenty of material to work with. Of course even that would be manageable if it wasn’t for the bone behemoths. The rank-7 monsters weren’t something they could handle in bulk. Him and Jackson would probably be able to take out 1 without putting themselves in a really bad situation, but 6… Well even escaping this many high rank monsters. The only mercy is that the behemoths clearly weren’t under the commanders control, and are much less focused on them than the skeletons are.
“Got any tricks for this!” Jackson took a tail swipe to his stomach and then went flying, and Azura noticed an incredibly small crack appear in the rib cage of the behemoth that hit him. The behemoths themselves varied. 2 of them were clearly dinosaurs, albeit with surprisingly long arms for the t-rex who’s shape they had mostly followed. The other 4 seemed to be mammoths.
“Are you kidding?! I’m barely keeping them distracted!” The familiars were out dealing with the small fry so that Jackson and he could focus on the much bigger threat. Thanks to his copies they were able to just barely keep the giant creatures distracted without taking too many hits, but they didn’t really have anything that could consistently do any real damage. If Reign was willing to expend a ton of energy the dragon could go toe to toe with 1 of the creatures and win, but with 6 of them not only would that not be all that helpful, but it would put Reign in some very real danger.
“Well we need to come up with something, or we’ll be joining the undead monsters of the Graveyard.” There were living monsters here too, but they were giving the fight a wide berth. Which was smart with the colossal monsters known as behemoths currently participating. Most living monsters would just get trampled underfoot, and unlike skeletons they wouldn’t be able to just rebuild themselves.
He frowned. He jumped to the side as a giant tusk attempted to gore him, then shot out his sword at the Behemoth that attempted to gore him. He immediately retracted the blade pulling him out of the way of the closing jaws of one of the dinosaur behemoths. Landing on the mammoth Behemoths back he immediately had to use magic to stick to the large spine he currently found himself on. The Mammoth continued randomly stampeding around completely ignoring him even as he slid around till he was inside of the creature standing upside down on the spine. The behemoth shook violently as the dinosaur shaped one tried to reach him through the bones of the one he currently stood inside.
He hummed curiously. Did the bone creatures have a way of sensing life? But if that was how they hunted, why were the living monsters unharmed even though they entered the Bone Graveyard too? He shook his head. He'd have time to think of that later, he had more important things to worry about. He tried to navigate to the center of the rampaging fossil he was currently inside of even as it fought one of its brethren. The dinosaur being more than willing to tear it apart to get to him. Unfortunately behemoths had a lot more bones than an actual skeleton of said creature would contain, and were of course several times larger. Navigating to the center of this mess of bones was far from an easy process, and it wasn’t safe either. He’d gotten a few cuts from narrowly avoiding sharp bones as they moved.
It didn’t seem to be targeted though, they most likely were simply moving as the Mammoth fought the dinosaur rather than any kind of actual defense mechanism. Even if he couldn’t find the core and disable it just having 2 of the colossal beasts fighting each other instead of going after Jackson and his copies was a pretty major win. He had to quickly jump to another bone as a bone from above slammed into the one he had previously been standing on. The rumbling informed him that wasn’t the only bone that was falling. The Mammoth falling apart before he got to the core was the worst case scenario, because then the beast could rebuild, and he’d have to start his search completely over. He rushed through the maze of bones avoiding the falling debris and the bones that jutted as the beast moved. Using his sword to change direction mid air, and narrowly avoiding death left and right. The magic inside the creature was too dense for his more intricate spells, so teleporting wasn’t going to happen.
He slid under a bone that had been sent flying towards him, and immediately had to use a burst of wind to shoot himself into the air to dodge the sharp bone that had nearly impaled him. He shot his sword at a bone to his right, and yanked himself away from the falling bone that wanted to make him a pancake. He panted as he continued to rush through the collapsing maze. Perhaps this plan wasn’t as clever as he thought. He supposed it made sense that going for the core would be just as dangerous as fighting it normally or everyone would just do that.
Still he was invested at this point, so there was no turning back now. He continued to rush through the stark white world that he found himself in. He was so deep in the center of the bone mammoth that he could no longer see the outside. He twisted sideways narrowly avoiding losing his armas the bones was standing on moved violently and almost smashed him into another bone. Rather than be worried about that though all he could do is smile.
***
Azura’s copy stared coldly at the knight that had intercepted his attack. his hand had impacted an energy wall a few mere inches from the princesses face. The wall had cracks in it as it barely restrained his force, and the knight clearly knew better than to leave him time to attack it again. Lux swung his sword horizontally above the princess’s head forcing him to dodge backward. The knight was fast, and his defenses were solid even hastily set up like that last one. The knight hadn’t had time to get in front of him before he hit the princess so was forced to make an energy wall instead of using his shield, but the wall had served its purpose.
He growled. He couldn’t stand when people got in his way. 4 magic circles appeared around the knight and the princess as he pulled out his bow. Without any copies he couldn’t use this spell to its full effectiveness, but he’d just have to overload it with as much power as he could to make up the difference. “Epsilon canon: barrage mode.” He shot a blast of energy from his bow into the magic circle directly in front of him and then each of the 4 circles around them shot out much more powerful beams at the knight and the princess. He didn’t know why he hated the princess so much, or at least in these moments where he was no longer restricted by the seal. Carry over he supposed. It was only in these moments where he released the seal that he could truly think clearly. Friends, enemies, allies? What value did any of those things have? He fought because he’d be rewarded. He attacked the princess because it would put his actual opponent in a bad position simple as that.
“Azura what are you doing?!” He heard his ‘friends’ scream at him. Worry, confusion, fear, and more swirling around as everyone tried to grasp the situation. He didn’t hesitate to put his hand on the ground and summon tendrils of ice that raced towards the voices. Lux had foolishly promised no one would get hurt, that meant the knight would spread himself thin trying to protect everyone else, and in that moment where his own defense was compromised to protect everyone else… That was when Azura would strike.
Barriers of light blocked all the ice tendrils as he’d anticipated, of course he had already prepared his next attack. 4 magic circles directly lined up in front of his bow that was glowing with far more energy than before. “Epsilon canon: Force mode.” He released his attack, the already blinding mass of energy growing bigger and bigger as it went through each circle. He didn’t have the kind of power to break through Lux’s guard, or at least not if Lux got to focus all of his defense on one attack, but even the strongest knight of Delford couldn’t shield everything at once.
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Sure enough when the blinding light from the attack cleared. Lux stood in front of the princess armor in tatters. The knight's shield lay in pieces around his feat. Azura growled angrily anyway, after all the man before him was still mostly uninjured. He prepared another spell, but didn’t get the chance as Lux had rushed at him. The knight had realized fighting defensively put him at a huge disadvantage. That was unfortunate for Azura, he wasn’t strong enough to beat the knight in a straight fight, well the knight couldn’t abandon defending everyone else though so he could just attack anything living and prevent Lux from having the time to properly get on the offensive. If a few of the other students died, well it wouldn’t be his problem.
***
Jackson was cursing loudly. He didn’t expect the trip to be easy, but 6 behemoths? He could definitely say that was well beyond his expectations. If it wasn’t for Marcus’s familiars, and his clones they would have already been overrun. He could take a lot of punishment, and he could regenerate from most energies, but only so long as he had magic power, and these were the kind of odds where running out of mana was a real possibility. Thankfully whatever the kid was doing to get 2 of them to fight each other was working spectacularly. Thanks to that distraction they had held out long enough for the familiars to find a way to permanently finish the small fry. Which meant a lot more allies attacking the behemoths. He still didn’t think it would be enough.
The unoccupied dinosaur behemoth swung its oversized claw at him. He tanked it and was sent flying. His body was far tougher than it looked though, and the minor injuries he did receive swiftly healed. The behemoth however lost its arm as the connecting bone snapped in half leaving the arm to fall to the ground. The following roar shook the whole area. They were at a disadvantage in more ways than 1. The bone graveyard was almost entirely black sand with the bone jutting out at random. That gave plenty of material for the bone type monsters to use, while they were stuck with the terrible footing that sand provided.
He was shaken from his musings though when the mammoth behemoth the kid had disappeared inside started vibrating rapidly. A loud grinding noise came from it as the bones shifted together and apart rapidly. The dinosaur that had decided to go for Marcus despite his location took no heed and simply stuck its mouth inside its now imobile opponent. To his surprise the dinosaur simply started vibrating as well making the sound even louder, to the point where it was impossible to hear anything else. Then both beasts imploded. Collapsing in on themselves before violently shooting outward. A sphere of thick ice rested where the monsters had originally stood with bones jutting out of it. Only a second past before the ice sphere exploded outward as well revealing a practically torn up Marcus. It was easier to count the places where there weren’t injuries. Despite the bloody mess the boy currently seemed to be, the kid seemed to be smiling holding onto some kind of glowing blue and silver orb.
Suddenly the remaining 4 behemoths all froze and turned towards the orb staring intently at it. Marcus walked slowly towards him. The 2 clones seemed to have vanished, and the familiars returned to Marcus with the sun bird releasing a golden light from where it perched on the kids shoulder. The light seeped into Marcus slowly healing the many cuts all over the boy’s body. “This won’t hold their attention for long. As soon as I get near you we’re going to have to make a run for it.”
“How?” It didn’t make any sense. He had heard of people using monster cores to trick monsters into believing they were a monster, but the remaining 4 wouldn’t be frozen like that if that was what Marcus had done. Moreover undead monsters typically have purple monster cores, certainly not blue ones, much less silver. The number of monsters that had silver monster cores could probably be counted on both hands with fingers to spare.
“I’ll explain later, for now… run!” The orb lost its light and the monsters started moving again all at once. Marcus started running, and he was quick to follow. They set an impressive pace. He could go faster if he was on his own, but the speed was solid for someone as young as Marcus. Not unheard of by any means, but better than the vast majority for sure. Not that he was really focusing on that right now. He was far more concerned about what had just happened. Azura hadn’t even been damaging the behemoths before, his attacks all basically amounting to distractions so that Jackson only had to deal with 1 or 2 at a time. So how did he go from that to taking out 2 of them at the same time?
The behemoths weren’t particularly quick, but even if their limbs moved slowly the sheer size still had them moving at a pretty solid pace. They were staying ahead, but they weren’t gaining any ground. They likely wouldn’t get a break until they escaped the area, and he wasn’t going to wait until then to have this conversation. Both because he was extremely curious, and because their mad dash would most likely carry on through the night and they would have to forgo sleep until they were somewhere safer. “Ok walk and talk… except you know running instead. What the hell was that? I’ve never seen behemoths just stop like that, and that explosion thing was pretty wild too!”
“Seriously?! Can’t this wait? It’s not exactly a simple explanation, it won’t make any sense to you without visual aids.” He growled. Who did this kid think he was? He was an a-rank adventurer. He may not have gone to a fancy mage school, but he knew how magic and monsters worked.
“Try me. I’m smarter than I look.” The brat had the nerve to shoot him a skeptical look before shrugging.
“Fine. I got deep into the Mammoth behemoth and found its core. It took a while to break through the bone cage so I could actually grab the core, but once I had it I enchanted it to absorb all the energy animating the behemoth and then force it all out in a wave I designed to disrupt the energy holding the other behemoths together. Unfortunately only 1 was in the range of the implosion. That bit is pretty simple, but here's where it gets complicated.” He already regretted asking. The kid was simplifying a lot leaving most of the details out, but that didn’t make it a simple concept.
“So the reason the other monsters froze is because of the way they hunt. I discovered that they hunt based on the feel of mana. That’s actually why civilians are less likely to be attacked in the wilds than mages. So I used the core that was nearly empty due to my previous trick to create a contradiction. It was radiating magic power that was both monster and human, and also neither. I directed its magic around them, and they couldn’t process the new feeling, rendering them unable to make a decision.” How could it be both and neither? And why didn’t he feel anything if it was radiating enough magic to confuse the behemoth’s?
“I guess that makes sense.” He understood why it worked at least, even if the how was still a bit beyond him. Honestly he was more impressed that the kid had managed to say all that while gasping for air as they ran full tilt towards Ragnarok Pass. It was an extremely deep valley, and getting down there was a risky proposition for a few reasons, but it was one of the safest ways to World’s End. Definitely better than crossing the Fields of Apocalypse. That would kill them for sure.
“We aren’t outrunning them! Will they stop following us once we leave the graveyard!” Well the monsters probably wouldn’t chase them into the valley since there wasn’t really any way for them to control their fall. They were tough creatures, but they would have no material to regenerate broken bones with down there. Even if the beasts did follow them, he was pretty confident they could handle it. Since Marcus must have some attacks capable of breaking the bones or he wouldn’t have been able to get the core.
“Even if they don’t, they will be a lot more manageable in the valley than they are here.” Still he was starting to get a little tired, and knowing he had at least a few more hours of running like this, and probably at least another hour or 2 to find a safe place before he could rest was a bit frustrating. At least he was making good money for this quest. He had managed to get a few chunks of bone, and he imagined the kid would pay pretty well for them.