Chapter 22. Dropped into the Fight.

Chaos reigned in the critical location. More of the naga, equipped with spears and odd, wicker shields, held a line about twenty naga long. Their right flank was anchored on the lake, and to their left, the line bent back. Swarming the line was a slew of crazed naga mixed with more of the rabid gnomes.

Given what the line of naga warriors was facing, Silas figured out which side he should probably be helping. The summoning platform gave him a height advantage and made it easy to pick off the crazed attackers without risking collateral damage among the naga shield wall.

He began to squeeze off shots and the first few caused a distraction among both groups as they looked toward the top of the platform to see where the loud sounds were coming from. A naga at the right end of the shield wall raised his spear and waved it toward Silas, possibly in greeting.

It could have been Nebram that waved the spear, but frankly, Silas really couldn’t tell these naga apart. The crazy ones were easy enough to distinguish. They wore tattered clothing and didn’t use weapons, but the others all blended together.

Walking his shots among the main mass of attackers, Silas had put down eight with a total of ten shots when a large knot of the creatures broke off from attacking the naga and charged toward the platform. Shifting to full auto, Silas hosed down the attackers, but there were at least forty of them still alive when the bolt locked back on an empty chamber.

Taking a grenade off his LBV, Silas pulled the pin and tossed it down the steps. It clanked to the bottom and rolled toward the crowd charging the stairs. With a blast that Silas felt at the top of the platform, the grenade exploded just as the first attackers started to climb.

Like they had been knocked down by the hand of a giant, a whole swath of attackers fell as the shrapnel buzzed around the area. The horde stopped at the destruction, giving Silas enough time to change out his mag before shifting back to single shots at the surviving attackers.

Only a score of attackers survived the explosion, and many of those were bleeding from various wounds that the nasty fragmentation grenade had torn into them. Banging away at the survivors, Silas thinned the herd as they resumed their climb toward the top of the platform. The death and destruction of their comrades seemed to drive them into a greater frenzy.

The new magazine was emptying quickly, and Silas decided to use one of the System skills he had earned with his class. He activated Ammo dump which began to add a bullet to his magazine at a rate of one every five seconds. It was too slow to keep up with his rate of fire, but the enemy were getting too close to swap mags, and if he tried, they’d overrun him.

Silas didn’t like the odds of going into hand-to-hand combat with one of the crazed attackers, let alone more than one. Just as the first of the attackers were about to reach him, a loud bark sounded from his side. A System prompt that Silas quickly brushed away explained what had just happened.

Your companion, the being known as Buster, activated Sonic Disruption for the first time.

Buster’s bark had some force behind it and the three surviving attackers to reach the top of the platform were blasted off their feet, or in the case of the naga among them, their tails. Silas could see the impact as their flesh compressed like it was being punched by a boxer wherever the Sonic Disruption hit.

The trio of survivors bounced down the hard stone steps, adding to the damage Buster had just wrought on their bodies. Silas wasted no time and finished them off with one shot each. With the immediate threat over, Silas looked over the battlefield.

Bodies of the attackers were stacked up in front of the naga shield wall, and as Silas watched, they took five steps back to open up more room to fight. They seemed unpracticed at the maneuver, and several gaps in their line were exploited by the crazed attackers.

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Silas couldn’t help them in the melee portion of the battle, so he turned his attention back to the attackers still approaching the line of naga defenders. After three quick rounds, his rifle was empty. Silas could feel another round appear in the magazine as his ability did its thing. The crowd had thinned considerably, and even if Silas stopped firing, he figured the Naga defenders had this in hand.

Every five seconds, whenever a new round was loaded into his rifle from Ammo Dump, Silas tried to pick off an attacker. His shots hit more often than they missed, and he figured the fight was just about over when Buster let out another, non-Sonic Disruption bark of surprise. Something hit Silas in the back, pushing him down onto the first step.

He could feel something snap in his right shoulder and the entire arm went numb. Small hands clawed at his neck and out of the corner of his eye, Silas could see a pair of crazed gnomes had hurled themselves at him. Thanking whoever was listening that he wasn’t pushed down the stairs all the way to the bottom, Silas tried to buck his attackers off his back.

With an angry growl, Buster laid into one of the gnomes, pulling it off Silas before savaging it with his teeth and claws. The System had given Buster a Natural Weapons skill, and he was using it to full effect. Silas, unfortunately, had nothing to stave off the second attacker who was now biting into the flesh at the back of Silas’ neck.

A moment later, Buster grabbed the gnome on Silas’ back, pulling him away. The first one was torn up and still functional and now the pair turned their attention to the dog. Silas was having none of that and painfully rolled over, his shoulder going from numb to excruciating in under a second.

The pain threatened to overwhelm Silas, and he felt himself slipping into unconsciousness. A whelp of pain from buster as one of the gnomes bit down on his paw snapped Silas back into the fight. Struggling with his left hand, Silas awkwardly drew the 1911, and lined up on the gnome shredding Buster’s right front leg.

With an even louder boom than the rifle, the heavy .45 caliber pistol round knocked the relatively light gnome off Buster. His dog turned its attention back to the surviving gnome, which was already bleeding heavily from Buster’s earlier attack. With a quick lunge, Buster ripped the throat out of the crazed gnome, ending the last nearby threat.

With a grunt of pain, Silas sat up, ready with his pistol to deal with any fresh attackers. Limping, Buster came over to sit next to him on the first step at the top of the platform. The rest of the attackers were focused on the naga, who now outnumbered their foes.

“Here, Buster, it’s supposed to help with our health regeneration, so I guess we should eat one,” Silas said, digging with his one good hand into the pack where the bundle of meat sticks was located. Buster snatched the first one from his hand and made happy noises as he chewed into the preserved mystery meat.

Silas was grossed out by the goblin foodstuff but began to chow down despite his repulsion. Anything to help his ruined shoulder and the still-bleeding back of his neck was worth the nasty taste. To Silas’ surprise, the meat didn’t taste good, but it was edible. Thankfully, there wasn’t much flavor other than a faint hint of salt and smoke. As he finished the stick, a new prompt appeared.

You have consumed a Goblin Meat Treat. This food item has granted you a 10% bonus to health regeneration for the next hour. Buffs from food items do not stack, and only the most powerful benefit will remain if you consume additional items that provide a benefit.

Well, it looked like the System had an official name for the dodgy meat sticks, and having finished his, Buster whined for more.

“Sorry, buddy, the bonus doesn’t stack, and we may need these again later,” Silas told the disappointed pup.

Pain flared anew in his shoulder, and Silas could feel the bones and tendons moving around as the accelerated System healing took over. The blood that had been dripping from the back of his neck slowed to a stop, and the wound went from hurting, to itching in record time.

Down by the lake, the naga finished off the last of the attackers. Silas now noticed more of them coming out of the cave entrances in the cliff face. He had noticed the caves when he first claimed the area, and it looked like the naga had used them to hide their non-combatants. An older looking naga that moved with a pained slither that Silas could empathize with, led several young ones as they moved to assist the battered defenders.

A naga by the lake, maybe the one that had waved his spear at Silas, gathered two of his companions and began to head toward the summoning platform. Nebram had proven himself a friend, but the rest of the naga hadn’t exactly been cordial with Silas the last time they’d met.

Until the healing finished up, there wasn’t much Silas could do other than have Buster haul back his rifle, which had slipped down to the bottom of the platform during his scuffle. With only one arm working, he couldn’t properly use the weapon right now, but the naga didn’t need to know that.

Clumsily swapping out the pistol mag for a fresh one, Silas was at least still armed if things turned sideways with the approaching naga.