Dante didn’t feel any sense of victory. Just overwhelming relief. Terror he had been suppressing flooded back and he wanted nothing more than to cower in this crack. That urge ended when Pauwna attempted to rise, stumbled, and collapsed. He threw the crossbow aside and wormed out of the crack to make his way over to her. Before he arrived, she uttered: “[Return].”
The animated blood on her claws and arms splattered to the ground. However, a small amount remained and absorbed into her skin. Her breathing became less ragged and her poise improved. Dante wished he had something like that, his skin still felt raw from tanking the flame breath. He wondered idly why he had heard that system command in English, but filed that under things to think about later. He offered a hand to her which she accepted. He supported her over to some rubble where they sat. Pauwna rummaged in her pack, brought out a small flask and drained it. She shuddered, closed her eyes, and braced as tremors ran through her form. He didn't blame her. If that potion was like the one Sūnva had given him when they first met, she was in a world of hurt. It didn’t seem like they were moving at least for a little bit, so Dante turned to his flashing notifications and opened them.
[Sharpen Senses] has advanced to Level 4
Level 18 [Adolescent Ahsmati] has been slain
Your Participation: 13%
Calculating Experience …
Congratulations! You have advanced to Level 4
[Split Second Reactions] has advanced to Level 4
[Chameleon] has advanced to Level 3
[Overloaded Warding Flesh] has advanced to Level 6
You have acquired the [Crossbow] skill.
That was … a lot to take in. I guess that answers what is the best way to level up, he thought while taking a glance at the mangled lizard man. Or Ahsmati, according to the notification. An adolescent at that.
A child.
Bile rose in his throat and he looked away. Finding that he no longer had any taste for his blood money, Dante opened his [Status] just long enough to distribute his three stat points and then dismissed it.
+3 to constitution.
Name: Dante Embry
Race: Human
Class: Unclassed
Level: 4
Attributes
Alacrity 9 Endurance 14 (17) Charisma 7 Fortitude 17 Cognition 14 Perception 11 Constitution 18 Strength 8 Dexterity 12 Willpower 14
Skills
Brawl (Common)
2 Crossbow (Uncommon) 1 Deception (Common)
1 Lock Picking (Uncommon)
4 Logic (Rare)
4 Menial Labor (Common)
4 Sleight of Hand (Uncommon)
1 Stealth (Uncommon)
2
Abilities
Chameleon (Rare)
3 Sharpen Senses (Uncommon)
4 Split Second Reaction (Rare)
4 Warding Flesh (Unique) [Specializations Available]
6
Traits
Fickle Fate (Unique)
MAX Human Tenacity (Racial)
4
A feeling of numbness swept over his body. Ah. I forgot about this. I haven't tried constitution yet either since I got my body back. He lolled to the side as the worst head rush he had ever experienced swept over him. Unlike the other [Attribute] changes, this one lingered for what must have been a minute. After it passed, Dante stretched and flexed his muscles. He felt … good. Really good.
Many aches and pains, some that he never even realized that he had, diminished or disappeared entirely. Examining his hands, the many blisters he had acquired had faded. I might be able to use this to heal injuries in a pinch. Normally, Dante would want to test out and puzzle out exactly what changed. He just couldn’t summon the enthusiasm for that now.
When Pauwna stood up to leave, he followed right on her heels. If anything she was moving too sedately for him. He picked up the crossbow again along with a satchel of bolts that he hadn't noticed before. He reloaded, then slung it over his back. He was ready for Pauwna to stop him, but she never did.
She turned down an intersection unto one of the passageways that connected trenches. To his profound relief, they soon left the majority of the bodies behind. That wasn’t to say that there were no bodies. There was a steady stream of them.
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Human and Ahsmati both.
At least, he thought they were Ahsmati. He quickly came to realize that there was no commonality between them. Some looked like the one they fought, but others were more humaniod. Some even had wings. The only commonality was that they were all reptilian, though even that was not ironclad. He saw one that had cold, clammy skin like a frog.
Perhaps Ahsmati refers to an alliance of races? It would certainly make sense then why the human side was losing. Their surroundings supported that theory. The human corpses outnumbered the Ahsmati by nearly three to one. Dante began to wonder how humans had ever held the line if losses like this were common.
Each time they found a human body, Pauwna would occasionally crouch over it and inspect their wounds. In one particular instance, she poked and prodded into a man's intestines, which nearly made him empty his stomach again. She didn’t even look disturbed while doing so. Dante turned away in disgust.
How long until I become inured to this too?
Based on the small sounds of displeasure she made after she stood up, it seemed that she wasn’t finding what she was looking for. What that was exactly, he had no idea. She also would go through the dead's belongings if they had bags. No wonder she didn’t make a fuss over that incident.
In the middle of one such inspection, there was a sudden flash of light that painted everything white. Dante turned towards the source. Where once there had been one of the enormous threads that made up the great barrier, There was now nothing but dissolving shards floating toward the ground. It had come from the direction that they had been heading.
“T’val so velan!” Pauwna cursed.
She bounded forward, no longer traveling at Dante’s speed but had barely made it three steps before there was another flash. He whirled around and saw that another thread had fallen. When he looked back at Pauwna, he saw that he was alone. His blood turned to ice.
He couldn’t believe that she would leave him. Without her, he would die to the first enemy he met. What was he going to do now?
Dante staggered as a shockwave struck him. It was worse than nails on a chalkboard, so loud that he could feel blood streaming from his ears. He clamped his hands over his ears as it increased in pitch. He fell to his knees, then the ground, as the pain in his ears increased. The seamless stone next to his head spiderwebbed, then fractured. Speckles of mud peppered him and began to flow down the walls.
Then as quickly as it began, it stopped, leaving only ringing in his ears. He removed his hands and stood up. The general feeling of well-being that he had received from the constitution increase was gone. His flesh felt like it had been tenderized with a mallet.
What the hell was that? Some kind of sound attack?
Gazing around, he quickly found the problem. The great barrier had fragmented. The membrane was cracked in the area where the two strands were missing. The barrier itself was more translucent and thinner. The everchanging magic circles were gone entirely. It seemed like all the magic artillery spells were now targeting that point. He watched as a strange purple bolt approached the spot. No reactive barrier arose to intercept it and it pierced through easily. Followed by another and another.
This was bad. He was once again an ant in a battle between giants. What could he even hope to do in the face of this?
Perhaps I could run away. Now would be the perfect time. My jailors are gone and I can blend in well enough with this uniform. It may be risky, but anywhere is better than here.
As if to prove that point, a tremor ran through the ground. Large chunks of stone were thrown through the air as something exploded. Dante stumbled to his feet and ran in the same direction that Pauwna had left. He turned from the path that was littered with bodies and avoided any turn that had bodies or the sound of combat. This led to him backtracking several times as he would start down a path only to find fighting. Eventually, he arrived at a split where both options had the sounds of conflict. He picked one at random, went around a bend, and found a battle. There was a large square at the center of which lay a ritual circle. Above the circle lay one of the threads that held up the great barrier. A circle of mages were clustered around it in some sort of arcane ritual and around them, a fierce battle raged between human soldiers and Ahsmati.
The Ahsmati were far outnumbered, but each seemed to tie down four times their number. Much like he had observed, there were many types of Ahsmati. He spotted several that looked like the one he had fought save for coloring. However, there were also other types. They ranged from small winged serpents which weaved through the conflict nimbly, to lumbering goliaths which tossed aside foes.
Before he could decide what to do, There was a cracking sound. Dante turned around to see the primordial dragon again. It was perched on the side of the great barrier with its claws penetrating the arcane membrane. From this distance, he now realized just how massive it was. You could fit the entirety of the barracks within its clawed grip. With a titanic effort, it heaved, and the barrier split. Before his disbelieving eyes, it tore the hole wider and clawed its way in. Once free, it spread its wings and took flight.
Inside the barrier.
It swooped over the battlefield and spewed death upon the landscape. If he wasn't mistaken, the dragon was headed straight towards them. Before he could decide what to do, it spoke.
"[Virulent Putrification]".
The booming command was perfectly audible even past the ringing in his ears. It shook the world and demanded attention. The breath that it had breathed darkened until it became a black that consumed light. In it, he saw the very stone of the trench corrode away. Flesh ran like water and bone melted. Dante swallowed nervously as it approached his location, suddenly less confident in the ability of [Overloaded Warding Flesh] to survive that. Not that he had much choice now, there was no escaping the doom that approached. All he could do was endure.
The battle behind him had changed its tenor as all the Ahsmati took to the skies. Some carried their non-flying brethren, though the large ones were left behind. Such foes simply relied on their bulk and large stride to carry themselves away. As for the human soldiers, most scattered though some stayed. Amongst their number, he spied both Pauwna and Svōl. The square was soon clear of all living enemies.
The dragon drew close enough that he could see the baleful fire in its eyes and the roiling gas in its opened its maw to deliver death upon them. Before the breath could exit its mouth, a comet of fire arced over them and smashed into the dragon's snout. Despite being a speck compared to the dragon's colossal form, somehow the comet won and the gas was diverted. The dragon roared as it rebounded from the impact, even louder than the last time. Dante gasped as the pain in his ears redoubled.
The comet flared and golden fire rained down upon the battlefield. It was impossible to dodge and Dante didn’t try to. He recognized the individual above. It was the regal woman who had healed him when he had first woken up in this world. The gold fire struck him and washed away his aches, exhaustion, and the pain in his ears faded away.
The dragon snarled and exhaled its cloud of death upon the woman. The black fumes clashed against gold flames and dissipated. In response, the woman reached out with one hand and spoke with a voice that reverberated through the battlefield: “[In my Demesne, none can fly].”
All of the flying Ahsmati plummeted, their wing flaps doing nothing to halt their descent. Even the dragon dropped before it steadied itself with a clear effort. A chorus of fleshy thuds resounded as thousands of bodies struck the ground. Dante didn’t think he would ever forget the noise.
He jumped as one of the bodies struck right beside him with a crunch. It was an impish little thing, about the size of a child. It was more snake than lizard and had a long, sinuous body topped with entirely too small wings.
It stirred and Dante fumbled for his crossbow. He got it up and aimed at its head as it looked up with unfocused eyes. He hesitated and it lunged. Needle fangs sunk into his thigh. Dante's finger tightened and the crossbow released its payload with a thunk. The bolt struck true and buried itself into Ahsmati's body. Its only response was to wrap itself around the rest of his leg and tighten. The bone creaked and flared with pain. Dante began bashing the snake with the crossbow frantically. It let out a pained hiss and swatted the weapon with its tail, sending it flying down the trench. There was a hollow crack and the pain in his leg intensified several folds. He fell to the ground.
He screamed, his voice instantly going hoarse. He pounded on its head with both hands hard enough that he felt fingers break. Despite this, it remained stubbornly latched on his thigh. He could feel burning in his veins.
Poison.
An idea flashed through his mind and he scrambled at the pouch full of crossbow bolts at his belt. Then, he placed his thumbs over its eyes and pushed. This finally elicited a reaction and the beast let only to lunge for his face. Dante thrust the bolt into its maw and it gagged. He kicked with his non-broken leg, jamming the bolt further down its throat. The pressure immediately slacked and he pried it off of his leg.
Dante gave himself a few seconds there on the ground, catching his breath. The ethereal fire around him flared and the sickness in his veins abated. He groaned as his broken bones ground against each other as they straightened, then fused. Groaning, he shifted so that he could look at the battle in the sky.
During his fight, the battle above had turned in their favor. The dragon’s once flawless exterior was now littered with gashes and a torrent of black blood rained down. The woman was untouched and wielded a sword staff of light at least twice her length. They were exchanging a series of blows that resembled explosions more than anything. In the end, the dragon was left with another gash above its eye.
They separated and Dante heard the woman's voice once again. The dragon, realizing its mistake, dove for her but it was too late.
[In my Desmense, you bow before your betters].
The dragon froze for just a moment, but that was enough. A barely perceptible slash later, and one titanic arm fell to the ground followed by a spray of blood. A large droplet landed near Dante and it sizzled straight through the stone. He scrambled to get to a wall, now just realizing that he had been groveling.
Regaining its bearings, the dragon doused its surroundings with its breath weapon. The woman flared her flames to cleanse the tide. They swiftly cleared to reveal the dragon fleeing along a few straggler Ahsmati, its stump still aflame with ghostly flames. The woman did not pursue it.
Instead, she turned to the small army and raised her spear. There was a pause, then a surge of noise as all the soldiers gave a victory cry. Dante glanced at the two missing pillars, the gap in the great barrier, and the still ongoing spell barrage.
He did not join in.