Gabriel looked up from his writing within the little house they had sheltered in for the night to see Cassie moving out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around her. She offered him a smile before going to get changed, as the necromancer stored his journal away. As she reemerged, donned in her bedclothes, he leaned against the warped desk he was seated at.
“You know, I’m surprised this house managed to survive so well. Save for a few holes in the kitchen wall, and the constant whirls of dust that have been left behind by those creatures, it’s still liveable!” he said with a grin, and Cassie nodded.
“Their destruction continues though. Their presence is very faint, so I know they’re far away, but there’s definitely a patrol we need to watch out for. Other than that, I think we can probably sneak into the palace by tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow? So soon?” Gabriel asked, a note of surprise in his voice. Cassie nodded yet again, looking out the shattered window to see down the road. The night’s darkness hid the home well, the inconspicuous building tightly packed alongside so many others.
“We’re less than nine hours’ walk away from the palace right now. I can tell because I used to walk down these streets all the time. I’m pretty sure I’ve sold something at this exact house more than once.”
Gabriel tilted his head now, looking down at the table with a breath.
“You do have a plan for getting us in, right? Because I have no idea how we’re going to get past the perimeter they’ve likely set up. If the barriers are holding, then the chalkians would likely be preparing a few fortifications around it for when it breaks.”
“Yeah. That should be easy enough, honestly. The creatures aren’t entirely the smartest, from what I’ve seen. I mean, my possum strategy worked against these idiots.”
“True. Very true.” Gabriel gave a heaving chuckle before shaking his head, getting up and locking the door.
Already, he could hear the loose rocks outside of the house being brought back to the window to block it off, along with a few more piling upon the door. He turned to see Cassie’s hands moving in intricate motions, bringing stones into fixed positions where they could fit perfectly together. Once the obstructions had been crafted by the stonelian, she ducked underneath the intact covers of the bed and rested her head against the slightly torn pillow. Gabriel, a bit sheepishly, moved in beside her. His own head sank against the cushion, and he smiled at her.
“I hope you don’t mind this. I just really don’t want to sleep on the flo-”
“It’s nothing. We’re here to survive, and part of surviving is restful sleep. I could care less about a slight feeling of awkwardness.”
Gabriel nodded in gratitude to his companion, before rolling over and closing his eyes. In the back of his mind, he felt like he was forgetting something, but the deep weight of exhaustion from the past few days without a decent sleep was too much for his mind. His eyes closed fully, and his breathing joined Cassie’s as they fell asleep in unison.
A crash and a thunderous explosion rocked Gabriel into a state of awareness, his eyes flying open as he sat bolt upright in his bed. The necromancer leapt to his feet, only to see Cassie with her finger on her lips, fiercely yet silently shushing him. He went silent now, steadily crouching over to her. Another explosion rocked the home as he did so, and he stared up in startled horror.
“What’s going on!?” he whispered in a fierce tone, and then he realised Cassie’s pale face.
“Something’s wrong!” she whispered back, looking around herself. “They don’t know we’re here because not a single attack has landed on this house, but something’s going on! It’s like they’re firing at something!”
Gabriel went silent before he could see peaks of light from outside the rock obstruction placed on the window. His eyes widened as he saw one thing in particular, and he looked at his hands.
“Cassie, can you move a rock please..?” he asked, his tone still hushed. Cassie complied reluctantly, and that’s when Gabriel saw it.
Gigantic platoons of the featureless beasts were flying and marching forwards. Even from this distance, the strange objects they held in their hands were discharging fierce blasts of energy towards an unknown location, and an angled look was all Gabriel needed to realise what was happening.
“Two things,” he muttered to Cassie, crawling back to her as she replaced the stone. “One, we’re much closer than we thought. That patrol you felt was probably a large platoon, just floating above the ground. The bastards have adapted, and they’re floating a few feet off the ground now. Two, they’re throwing everything they have at the shield. It looks like they’re trying to break it now, for some reason.”
Cassie’s face was whiter than the sheets they had slept in, though that wasn’t saying much, considering the debris that they had been covered in. Her eyes widened at him, and she looked over towards the recently enclosed window.
“Why are they doing this? Shouldn’t they wait it out?” she muttered desperately, and he shrugged. Despite the nonchalant motion, he was quaking. This was more than odd.
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“I don’t know. All I know is-” a shout from outside cut him off. Or, better yet to say, a guttural shriek. The formless snarling and spitting of the chalkiens that lurked outside rambled, with the mere sound of their speech enough to set his nerves on end. The auditory amalgamation continued for some time, and eventually, Gabriel just gripped Cassie’s arm.
“We need to get out of here!” he snarled in a hushed voice. “At the very least, we need to get to the Likaven’s palace and hide within the shield! No matter what they throw at it, it’ll be a decent barrier at the least!”
“How do we know that, though?!” she demanded, her voice slightly rising in pitch. He motioned for her to quiet down, and she reluctantly complied as her quaking voice continued. “For all we know, that shield’s down!”
“It’s clearly not!” Gabriel argued, already dragging her towards the blockaded door. “They would probably sound a great deal happier if they were winning!”
It took Cassie several seconds to respond. She just blankly stared at him, until her hand moved up to break the impasse. The stones dislodged themselves from the doorway, leaving an opening where the Hashvans could clamber out. Once they had reached the bottom floor, Gabriel began tearing several wooden planks from the kitchen floor to allow Cassie to reach her stone.
“Make us a tunnel!” Gabriel muttered, and Cassie complied. The rocks and asphalt tore away into a steep slide downwards, and as the two threw themselves within it, it closed behind them.
The path in front of them began to open as they came forwards. As if the rock would melt when Cassie came near, then reappear as she fell away. The aura of magic she had extended past her body was forming a path, though clouds of dust and chunks of debris would sometimes fall from the chaos that was unfolding above them.
Within minutes, Gabriel could see the shimmering light of the shield. Or at least, what he assumed to be the shield. But what it was remained a moot point, as the unclosed area of the tunnel a few feet behind them caved in to allow one of the chalkiens in.
Gabriel vaguely heard Cassie hold in a scream, muffling it to a soft squeak, as she stared behind her and then continued running. Gabriel followed suit, but it was pointless. The beast behind them, sporting four of the shapeless tendrils he had noted earlier, dropped to a nearly laying position before its four limbs went to work. It began to chase them at blinding speeds, shattering the few weak stones that Cassie tried to place in front of it.
However, right as the beast fell upon them, Gabriel unleashed a vicious cloud of his necromancy. Black smoke filled the tunnel they had created, billowing from within his cloak and from the palm of his hands as it rushed towards the creature. The chalkien shrieked out in presumable terror and agony as particles of its body came flying off, carried by the cloud of smoke that Gabriel had conjured. Pieces of the attacker were torn to shreds, turning to dust as they hit the ground.
Without a second look, Gabriel tore off after Cassie. That lone display of magic was enough to severely drain his energy, and he couldn’t even attempt to try again. He could feel his lungs about to give way but refused to stop running until he felt the odd sensation of passing through the Lakiven’s shield. Even after he had entered, he still ran after Cassie’s slowly disappearing form down the tunnel. He refused to call for rest, and only took a break when they exploded from the surface. He tore himself from the slowly closing ground underneath him and collapsed onto the chiselled and broken rocks.
He had rested for no more than a few seconds before his slightly closed eyelids flew open in shock. Down the streets, hundreds of his people were sitting behind the shimmering shield. Seemingly at random, they took their spears and swords and jabbed them at the beasts that tore at the shield. Shrieks rang out as the beasts were struck, pieces of their uncertain forms crashing into the ground and forming piles of dust. Even as he watched, a particularly furious slash from one of the Hashvan citizens cleaved a beast’s head off of its body, and the creature joined the rest of the debris.
Gabriel slowly dragged himself to his feet, feeling several cuts and bruises from his escape from the stone. His attention, however, was completely distracted from the discomfort. His concentration was entirely on the red-clad man that approached, who had a strange, flesh-coloured sword in his right hand.
“You managed to escape them, did you?” the man asked, his deep voice gravelly. Gabriel’s nod prompted him to continue, as Cassie rose to her feet shakily. “Good. They seem to be throwing everything they have at the shield, but it should be able to hold for another half hour. It’s enough to get a few weapons out.”
Gabriel stared in shock, her exhaustion fading alongside Cassie’s as she cried out.
“What?! But that shield was supposed to last a week!” she protested, and the Lichvan nodded with a grimace.
“It was supposed to. But something’s kept the Likaven distracted, almost as if something drained his magic. As a result, the shield is visibly dropping. We have one of his Lichvans with us, and he was able to tell us that the shield has lowered.”
“Wait?! One of his Lichvan is here?! Can’t we just be comfortable with that?” Gabriel cried out, and the Lichvan shook his head.
“The only things that are capable of being used as an effective weapon are our standard arms, except with layers of our peoples’ skin overtop of them. The Lichvan, Juvian, believes these creatures are highly adaptive. They will die in their puffs of dust and reform in their home realm, and then become resistant to the thing that killed them. And the race will share that trait. Raw magic is something that works as well”
“He gathered that through only a few days?” Cassie queried, and the Lichvan nodded.
“Juvian is a scholar. He found that since our race’s skin is something they have never faced in their lives, it’s fatal to them. So we took the dead corpses of the valiant soldiers and fitted their skin to the steel of our blades. It’s worked, but I don’t know what we can do against this. We’re not the last of our kind, but we’re the majority of it.”
Gabriel looked around the area, barely able to count a few hundred of his people. And in comparison, thousands of the beasts were hammering themselves into the slowly deteriorating shield. He took a breath as the Lichvan and Hashvien citizens prepared themselves, and he looked over at the invading forces. Even as the shields fell, his people were steeling themselves for the onrushing invasion. Already, he was resigned to his fate.
“Then I guess it’s time to die. After all, it’s not like we can do.”
And with a cry, he rushed towards the encroaching beasts, black smoke pouring from his body.