POV - Samantha
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Sam moved the plate of ice to obstruct the incoming projectile of acid. Unlike normal Ghouls, this creature’s attacks were highly pressurized, and they packed one hell of a punch. Normally that wouldn’t be such a problem for her, but the clinic was still vulnerable. When they had engaged the group of Corrupted, Sam had flown Ethel and her team to block the clinic and act as its guard.
Jonathan had taken on their leader Tristan, while Cara seemed to have a bone to pick with the sibling pair. Ethel and her team ran disruption, while Daphne acted as the middle guard and stopped anyone from approaching them.
Cara disappeared from Sam’s side and reappeared at point-blank range near Dante and fired, which he dodged with incredible reflexes. She then promptly reappeared nearby.
Sam wasn’t worried because she knew Cara was fast and that none of them could keep up with her, so she turned her attention to the Ghoul-man thing.
Not very scientific, but the next closest classification was a chimera and that felt wrong too.
A weave of Mana created the water she needed to flood the area, set-up for a multi-phase electrocution spell if she could swing it. In the meantime, Sam pulled the heat from the created water and shaped them into shards of ice. The beast-man had to dodge but she was not going to give him an opening so she kept a portion of her mind on him, raining down low leveled icicles. With [Air Mastery] she kept an eye on their surrounding and noticed movement just outside the clinic. Donovan and a small team of fighters were getting ready to rush out and help, and honestly, they could use it.
There was only a small number of other Corrupted here but they were disrupting the tides of battle. Jonathan had his work cut out for him with Tristan, all he needed was for an outside attack to disrupt his flow. The two had since been locked in combat and the worrying thing was that Tristan seemed neither too worried nor excited with the fight. He fought cold-bloodedly and at a measured pace.
Sam was used to seeing Jonathan control the flow of a fight, but he was just too drained at this point.
Keeping track of all the details of a fight was usually Mark’s job, and because she had to now fill that role, it meant that higher computational magic was out of reach. Things could change quickly in a fight and she couldn’t risk lowering her guard to pull out high-level magic.
She was proven right when the Ghoul-man came at her again, having decided he no longer needed to dodge her weak attacks and could take them head-on. Proving that, his body was incredibly resilient, but what about his constitution?
A snap of Sam’s fingers turned all the icicles into fine clouds of icy fog, clinging to the creature's body and setting in a terrible case of frostbite as his blood froze.
His skin turned blue and his body slowed, yet it somehow powered on. Daphne arrived near them now and blocked the creature, using her gauntlets to bat away. Sam saw the opportunity and slammed a chunk of ice down in front of him and he attempted to dodge but it clipped him sending him filing further.There was a yelp and the sound of breaking bones.
Donovan arrived next to Sam and Ethel with drawn brows, so she spoke directly to their teams.
“Keep a defensive line on the clinic, do not engage the remaining Corrupted humans.”
Donavan looked like he had something to say about that, but she didn’t have time for it. Mark would be hurt if he got too wounded or worse, so she’d keep an eye on him.
Sam turned to glance at the two, winged individuals. She was interested to know what their biology looked like under a microscope but shook that from her thoughts, kill now, study later.
Now able to refocus back in, she saw that Cara seemed to have experience fighting these creatures. The two siblings fought with a mixture of magic and blade. Dante created small feather-like darts from pink energy which he scattered about freely, and the woman had long flexible barbs attached to her wrists that she could extend out over two meters. Both siblings were incredibly fast and seemed to recognize Cara’s attack pattern. The speed was so extreme that they could only be using some form of air or enhancement magic.
No sooner had Cara appeared than they were arriving right next to her. Their chase after Cara was putting Sam on edge, unable to watch them any longer. She lashed out with a wave of heated air in the direction of the young woman, when it hit she fell out of the sky with a yelp and landed, turning to look at Sam with destain in her eyes.
Without a second thought, she charged and Sam sent a wave of fire toward her, which she dove under using her wings.
Now that she was closer all Sam could see was a cruel smile at the corners of her disturbingly perfect face. Her features were too clean, almost insectoid in nature.
Sam was ready for her but then something moved out of the corner of her eye. A glance confirmed her fears, the Ghoul-man was not dead. He survived being crushed like a cockroach and got to his hands and knees, lunging for Sam's throat. She turned to deal with it as well, but an Aura exploded out from behind her and its proximity allowed for her to feel the tightening of a noose around her throat.
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Three threats meant she had to prioritize, and if they were behind her, it could only be an ally's Aura manifestation.
Sam flattened her palm and brought a cushion of air down on Lilith while getting ready to block the other with her bracelet. It turned out to be unnecessary because all at once thin strands of red Aura dropped from above and wrapped around the Ghoul-mans arms and neck.
A glance behind her revealed it to be Donovan’s Aura stretching up from his hands like spider silk.
The Ghoul-man had halted in place and seemed to be struggling to move his own body. He looked similar to a marionette, with strands coming from his arms and legs, stretching up into the sky before fading.
Sam vaguely remembered a conversion Mark, Jonathan, and Donavan had had but she wasn’t clear on the details. Donavan must have figured out what was blocking him though because this was not his first time using it, his Aura seemed stable, and the Ghoul-man turned to fire a projectile of acid at Lilith, who yelled curses at them all.
Now Sam just had to deal with her and then she could go help Cara, she was about to charge the air with lightning when an earthquake shook the city. It was like someone had set off another bomb and Sam had to spread her stance to avoid falling on her ass.
Her head snapped towards the direction she had felt it coming from and saw nothing. It must have been near the edge of the city, far enough away that the buildings were blocking her vision of whatever it was that shook the whole area. If they had not begun to repair damaged infrastructure it may have even caused collapses.
Sam could only operate under the assumption that walls were breached, they had to finish this, and shore up the gaps in their territory.
She turned back in time to a sight that froze her thoughts. Jonathan had been locked in a stalemate with Tristan, but something must have changed because he suddenly picked up the pace and all Jonathan was able to do was defend. A final vicious kick to Jonathan's chest sent him crashing into an alleyway, caving a steel dumpster like it was made of tinfoil.
Tristan shouted in a cold voice across the clinic’s empty lot.
“Enough, all of you. Get what we came here for!”
Lightning began to wreath his sword as he built up the charge in his weapon.
In the next moment, he turned and made a dash right for Cara. Seeing him approach Cara panicked and blinked away from Dante, unfortunately, Tristan seemed to anticipate this and turned midstep, changing direction to where she appeared with blinding reactions, and fired the crackling line of black lightning.
Cara had bearly even recovered from the last jump so she was not expecting an attack to come so quickly, without time to even see what was going on, the bolt tore straight through her chest and heart.
Sam’s world slowed to a standstill, Cara hadn’t even screamed when the bolt hit, her legs just fell out from under her and she crumpled. Tristan was already taking a step toward her fallen form and all Sam could think was that Cara needed to teleport away right now, but the longer Cara remained still, the faster Sam’s reason left her.
Without realizing what was happening, the world shifted silver for a moment, and Sam crouched down and lay a shaking hand on Cara's side. There was no moment in her chest and Sam couldn’t feel even a faint pulse.
Sam couldn’t process what she was seeing, he killed her just like that. Sam needed to perform CPR until a healer could get here, they were so close to the clinic that there was bound to be one that could help.
Unfortunately, Sam’s mind only woke up when she heard Jonathan's horse cry above her desperation.
The battlefield does not wait for grief or god.
Tristan was above her, swinging a blade down toward her skull before she knew it. Grabbing hold, and trying to shield Cara, Sam triggered her bracer’s shield and got an arm up. Its barrier was already weak from everything they had been through today, so when the blade fell, all it managed to do was turn the cutting force into a bludgeoning club.
Both of their bodies were sent sailing across the tar and crashed to a skidding halt near the clinic's front door. Sam’s clawed grasp had not let go of Cara’s form but pain ground at her arm. It was definitely broken, but all Sam could feel was joy. They were okay, Sam had gotten them closer to the clinic.
Her excitement was short-lived because before she could even call for help Tristan came again and Dante took to the sky, joining his sister in diving towards Ethel. Daphne rushed to her side battered Lilith away. Donavan was still holding the other beast-man in his Aura but it was fading, everything was going to shit.
Sam tore heat from her surroundings and sent it toward Tristan to slow his advance, but he cut through it with a well-placed strike and coated himself in lightning.
The spell wasn’t effective and didn’t even put him in any danger, but it did slow him down long enough for Jonathan to get between the three of them.
Sam swallowed when she saw him. His shoulders were drooping and by the sound of his labored breathing, one of his lungs had collapsed in the last exchange. Yet even with all of this Tristan still paused, choosing to speak.
“Look I'm not here for this, just give me the damned crest, and I’ll leave.”
It was only then that Sam realized she had a flashing prompt from the system.
Current Module: [Cara Stax] has been slain.
Rewards: Crest of Mind(Mana)
Absorb: Yes/No
The words from the system almost sent Sam’s thoughts scattering once more, but she couldn’t afford to lose track of Tristan again, all she could spit out was two words steeped in as much venom as she could muster.
“Fuck. You!”
Tristan's face pursed as he took a step forward and heat baked the surrounding tar as Sam got ready to char the son of a bitch from existence.
What none of them expected, was one of Ethel’s glowing arrows to lodge itself below Tristan's ribs and puncture through to the other side. He hissed as black blood poured from his torso and Sam glanced in Ethel's direction.
She was still standing in the open with her bow drawn, but chaos had exploded near them. Daphne was still nearby, blocking Dante’s energy darts, while Boe and Donavan ripped into the restrained Ghoul creature.
All of them were so focused, that they didn’t notice Lilith dropping from the sky with rage on her face and stabbing her barb straight through Ethel’s neck.
Jonathan saw this and screamed, Aura bubbling from him like water from a dry riverbed, and then froze, Because Ethel turned around as though she hadn’t felt the attack and unleashed an arrow at point-blank range. Hitting the surprised Corrupted directly through the forehead killing Lilith instantly. For a moment those involved tried to figure out what had happened. The answer came a second later when Daphne fell to one knee and blood began gushing from her neck, coating her front armor in seconds.